Preamble

The House met at Eleven o'clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

Orders of the Day — CRIMINAL JUSTICE ADMINISTRATION (AMENDMENT) BILL

Order for Third Reading read.

Motion made, and Question proposed, That the Bill be now read the Third time. —[Mr. Mawby]

11.4 a.m.

Mr. Charles Doughty: I am sorry that my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Mr. Gurden), whose name appears on the Bill, has been prevented, unfortunately, from being in the House to move the Third Reading. Frankly, if I had had a little more time in which to consider the matter I could have assisted the House further in explaining the details of the Bill, although, as no objection was raised on Second Reading or in Committee, I do not expect many difficult questions. If any questions are put to me, I will do my best to answer them.
I have to declare an interest in this matter, because, as a recorder, I am one of the people who might be affected by the Bill. The Bill is primarily intended to enable a third court of quarter sessions to sit at Birmingham as and when it is required. It would ill become me to speak at great length on the tremendous amount of work which has been done at all quarter sessions, particularly in big towns such as Birmingham, because the whole question is being considered by the Streatfield Committee, whose Report we anxiously await. I have no special knowledge of Birmingham Quarter Sessions, but I know that throughout the country the number of indictable offences is about three times as high as before the war and twice as high as it was ten years ago. Certainly, in my own court it is twice as high as it was ten years ago.
We therefore see the necessity for additional courts. To my own kn6wledge, the Recorder of Birmingham has to sit very late every time he sits in his court. I hope that the Bill will enable Birmingham City Council, where the proper conditions are satisfied, to order a third court to sit for the ensuing year. The general question will be the subject of the deliberations of the Streatfield Committee and I know that the House will await that Committee's Report with great interest.

11.7 a.m.

Mr. Stephen McAdden: I take no strong exception to the Bill, but I must confess that I find it very surprising that the House should be asked to give a Third Reading to a Bill when none of its sponsors is present in the House and when not a single representative of the Birmingham constituencies, which, presumably, are most vitally interested in the matter, has thought it fit to attend. In those circumstances, I wonder whether the House is doing service to itself in passing legislation of this kind without a more adequate explanation than can possibly he given by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Surrey, East (Mr. Doughty), who has done his best, at short notice, to assist the House in the matter.
I suggest that unless we have some advice from my right hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General that the Bill is essential, we ought carefully to consider whether we should give it a Third Reading. I hope that my right hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General will not think that I am in any way casting any reflection upon him. I am sure that he is here to be of service to the House in the matter, and we are grateful to him, but it is wanting in courtesy to him that the promoters of the Bill, even if it is private Members' day, have not thought fit to acquaint the House with the purposes which they seek to achieve by the promotion of this Measure.

11.9 a.m.

The Solicitor-General (Sir Harry Hylton-Foster): I am here to have insults hurled at me if necessary, and, of course, my hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East (Mr. McAdden) is not being discourteous to me. What I suspect is that he may have forgotten at such an


early hour in the morning is that the purpose of the Bill was explained by the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Mr. Gurden) on the last occasion, when, I dare say, my hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East was not here. As memories may be short, I can perhaps indicate briefly what this extremely useful, and, I submit, obviously necessary, Bill does.
The Municipal Corporations Act, 1882, which is the Statute which the Bill proposes to amend, provides for establishing a second court of quarter sessions. It provided that a second court could be formed in certain circumstances, but all that procedure could be brought about only if before each quarter session it had been certified to the recorder in writing, signed by the mayor or two aldermen or the town clerk, that the council had resolved that it was expedient that the powers should be exercised.
Birmingham, being under great pressure in this matter, and to avoid the bother of having to have that special resolution every time, eventually enacted in a special Act, the Birmingham Corporation Act, 1954. that it could he done without a resolution, on the recorder taking certain steps. When the House enacted the Criminal Justice Administration Act. 1956, it extended the power under the Municipal Corporations Act to enable the drill there laid down to operate for more than one additional court. When this House did that it forgot the special provisions of the Birmingham Corporation Act, with the result that the Birmingham Corporation, having put it out of its power to pass the necessary resolution, has not been able to avail itself of the powers which the House intended to confer generally in the 1956 Act. All the Bill does is to go back, as it were, to the 1882 drill for a third court in Birmingham.
The second matter, dealt with in Clause 1 (2), relates to the remuneration of assistant recorders. The history of that matter, shortly stated, is that originally under Section 168 (8) of the Municipal Corporations Act, 1882, provision was made that
An assistant recorder, assistant clerk of the peace, and additional crier shall have the remuneration as appearing by the Fourth and Fifth Schedules.

For the assistant recorder the Fourth Schedule provided that he should have a certain number of guineas
for every day not exceeding two, or, by resolution of the council with the sanction of the Secretary of State, not exceeding six—
Section 61 of the Birmingham Corporation Act, to which I have referred substituted a new subsection for subsection (8) of the Act of 1882. This was a provision that,
An assistant recorder, assistant clerk of the peace and an additional crier shall have such remuneration as the council may resolve.
One would have thought that Section 15 of the 1956 Act implicitly repealed that special enactment in the Birmingham Corporation Act. This Bill, in effect, expressly repeals it, to avoid any doubt in the matter. The practical effect is that the remuneration of the Assistant Recorder in Birmingham will be, as is the remuneration of other assistant recorders under the 1956 Act, subject to the approval of the Lord Chancellor.
That is all that the Bill does. I strongly commend it to the House. It is purely a legislative accident, as it were, that this misfortune has happened to Birmingham, and I conceive it to be our duty to remedy their distress.

11.13 a.m.

Major W. Hicks Beach: I am on record as having said on many occasions that I thorough disapprove of legislation being passed through the House by the procedure known as "on the nod". This morning, I feel, we have seen something worse than that, because we have a Bill submitted for Third Reading without any of its promoters here to give us an explanation. The Bill has my full support, but it so happens that I have a question to ask about it. My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Surrey, East (Mr. Doughty) stepped into the breach at the last minute, and I should like to congratulate him on the explanation which he gave, but I do not think it fair to expect him to know the answer to this question, nor do I think that my right hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General knows the answer.
When this type of legislation is passed through the House we have a duty to the taxpayer. I am all for extending the scope and working of recorders, but I should like to know what the cost of the Bill will be to the taxpayer, as far as it


can be ascertained. On a Measure of this sort we are entitled to be told by the promoters of the Bill what they think it will cost. If they have no idea, we should be told so. I do not know whether my hon. and learned Friend has any idea of the cost or whether the promoters of the Bill know it. I shall have to fall back on my right hon. and learined Friend the Solicitor-General and put the question to him.
I am fully in agreement with deputy recorders being adequately paid. Subject to some idea being given of the cost of the Bill, I support it, but I do not think that this is the right way for legislation to be passed through the House.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed.

Orders of the Day — LANDLORD AND TENANT (FURNITURE AND FITTINGS) BILL

Not amended (in the Standing Committee), considered.

Clause 1.—(PUNISHMENT OF ATTEMPTS TO OBTAIN FROM PROSPECTIVE TENANTS EXCESSIVE PRICES FOR FURNITURE, FITTINGS, ETC.)

11.17 a.m.

Mr. Speaker: The first Amendment selected is that in the name of the hon. and gallant Member for Cheltenham (Major W. Hicks Beach) and the hon. and learned Member for Surrey, East (Mr. Doughty), in line 17.

Major W. Hicks Beach: I beg to move, in page 1, line 17, to leave out "item" and to insert:
article or collection of articles for which a price of more than two pounds is demanded".
During the passage of the Bill, certainly on Second Reading, although I cannot recall whether I did so in Committee, I made it clear that in principle I support the Bill, but that I think that as it is drawn it is quite impracticable and will be unenforceable. We must, however, use our best endeavours to put it into some kind of operative shape.
In Committee, my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. John Hobson) moved an Amendment to delete subsection

(1, b). The Amendment was fully discussed. I will not deal with his objections in detail, because I think that I can put them briefly. The objection to this paragraph is the reference to the written inventory. It would be necessary to specify against each item exactly the price being put on it. To take an absurd case, if one has an inventory for a contemplated sale which includes all kinds of furniture and there is also a bag of nails, one must state, for example,
One bag of nails, price 6d.
This is an altogether absurd Bill, but this is carrying it to the limits of absurdity.
As I have said, in Committee, my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington moved an Amendment to delete subsection (1, b). I though that the promoters would accept it. On that occasion we had the assistance of the Attorney-General, and I am sorry that he is not in his place, because I Should have liked a further explanation. When the point whether each specific item had to be priced in an inventory was raised by my hon. and learned Friend, my hon. Friend the Member for Exeter (Mr. Dudley Williams), in an intervention, also raised a similar point. We then had a reply from the Attorney-General Which makes it clear that my contention that each specific item in an inventory has to be priced is correct.
I do not want to delay the House unduly, but I should like to read what the Attorney-General said in Committee. In reply to the Amendment of my hon. and learned Friend and the intervention of my hon. Friend the Member for Exeter, he said:
My hon. Friend has again misinterpreted the Bill. It does not say that.
Now comes the important point:
An inventory must contain particulars of, and the price sought for, each item. That is the first step."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Standing Committee C; 4th February, 1959, c. 33.]
That is a specific statement by the Attorney-General that my contention that the Bill as drawn means that one has to price a bag of nails, a packet of safety pins or any other item, is correct.
The Amendment seeks to clarify the position by providing that one has only to put prices against items worth over £2. I would have liked to see the subsection deleted altogether, but, to try to meet the


wishes of the promoters of the Bill in some measure, it seems to me that if we say that only items above £2 should be priced we should get over what otherwise seems to be a complete absurdity. It is true that the stating of a price may raise difficulties because the person preparing the inventory may, if he likes, say, "I did not put it in because the price was under £2". I presume that he would be committing an offence under the Bill.
I am a practising solicitor and, therefore, I have to deal with matters like this. My view is that there will not ever be a prosecution under the Bill. The Amendment raises a very small point, and it may not even be necessary, but the principle in my view is right. I hope that the promoters, even at this late stage, will make a commonsense approach to the matter and accept this small Amendment, which I commend to the House.

Mr. Charles Doughty: I beg to second the Amendment.
I agree with everything that my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Major Hicks Beach) said. I hope that the Bill will reach the Statute Book. Like all Bills which reach the Statute Book, we hope that it will reach it in the best possible form. If we are able to make the Bill more practicable and sensible, we should all join together in doing so.
I should like to point out the effect of the provision and how it would work out in practice. Paragraph (b) reads:
… any person seeking to obtain or retain accommodation whom he provides with particulars of the tenancy, a written inventory of the furniture, specifying the price sought for each item.
The furniture would naturally include the fittings under the Bill.
I take the view that the whole paragraph goes too far, but we discussed that in Committee and the matter is now at an end. The effect of the paragraph is that if a prospective tenant goes to a house agent or to solicitors, who sometimes deal with these matters, and says, "Have you a furnished flat or house which I can take?", and the house agent or solicitor says, "Yes, there is a house available, but we want £500 for the furniture and fittings", a criminal offence is committed and the house agent or

solicitor would be liable to a fine not exceeding £100.
On Second Reading, I think it was the hon. Member for Clapham (Mr. Gibson) who produced a house agent's list, which was very properly sent out, containing details of furnished lettings, the price asked and the price asked for the furniture and fittings. It appeared to us that that list was certainly three or four pages in length. It may well have been more. I would not have been surprised if it had been more, because house agents in large residential districts in London have a large number of houses on their books.
What will happen in future? Under the Bill, the list which the hon. Member produced will be illegal, and the house agent can be prosecuted and a fine of up to £100 inflicted upon him unless there is set out in that list, in cases where money for fixtures and fittings is demanded, every item which will be included in the transaction. It will be impossible and impracticable to include in a list, which must contain the address, the length of the lease and the price asked, the last teaspoon and last tablecloth. As my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Cheltenham said, it is ridiculous to include every packet of nails and put against it the price of 6d., or whatever the price may be.
While accepting the principle of the paragraph, that a list which includes everything should be handed to a prospective tenant, the Amendment provides that it must be limited to items which are over £2 in value. This avoids the necessity of having to take an enormous and complete inventory and having to include trifling items below £2. It dispenses with the necessity of having it printed and copied upon every list sent out to a prospective tenant or upon every notice which is displayed, possibly in a shop window, or whatever the premises may be in which it is advertised.
In my view, the Amendment will improve the Bill and make it more sensible and practicable without in any way detracting from its force and usefulness.

Mr. Geoffrey Hirst: I support the Amendment, which I think is eminently sound and sensible. I cannot go quite as far as my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Major Hicks Beach) or my hon. and


learned Friend the Member for Surrey, East (Mr. Doughty), because I do not even hope that the Bill will reach the Statute Book. I have no doubt that it will, but that is one of the unfortunate things that occur from time to time. The Bill is not only absurd; it is unnecessary. On the other hand, if this completely unnecessary Bill, which is an absolute menace, has to go forward, it should go forward in a reasonable and sensible shape. At present it is absurd.
Although I did not serve on the Committee, I have read the proceedings fairly thoroughly. Although the Attorney-General tried to blind the Committee with legal science—which is a characteristic of his—it does not alter the fact that the early part of his remarks is quite categorical. It is a perfectly straight answer. The question is, does the paragraph include all items I suggest that it does include all items.
One of the things which I have learnt since I came to the House—and I hope that I have learned many things—is the positive and absolute danger of so-called assurances from the Dispatch Box. I absolutely loathe and hate them. I have seen them go wrong so often. We pass laws but do not interpret them. When we are told, "I assure the hon. Gentleman that it is not the intention" to do a certain thing, I am surprised at the gullibility of some much more capable and senior hon. Members than I who, possibly out of a form of politeness in which I do not indulge, accept those assurances. I do not accept them because I have had experience of their going wrong. They would seem to come out of Government Departments.
11.30 a.m.
It is astonishing that, considering the danger there is in accepting a statement of that nature, that sort of assurance is accepted here at all, because afterwards the matter goes out into the world and some proceedings take place—though I would say that I rather share the view of my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Cheltenham that this is an absolutely unworkable Measure in any case—and then the assurance given here does not count twopence, because what matters is the interpretation of the Measure in the courts of law.
If my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General was right—I am no

judge of that—in what he said in the Standing Committee, there is a danger of a lot of footling nonsense arising over a lot of nicknacks. Obviously, if the value is under £2 it is so small it could not matter less, and if the promoters of the Bill have in mind nothing of more value than that, they are more irresponsible than I consider them at present.
The Amendment would save unnecessary trouble. There really ought not to be need for a lot of talk upon a thing of this nature, for what is proposed by the Amendment is a very reasonable thing to do and would help a little tiny bit to make a thoroughly bad Bill a little less bad.

Mr. Stephen McAdden: I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Mr. Mawby) will look kindly upon this Amendment which has been proposed in such reasonable terms by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Major Hicks Beach) and supported by other hon. Members on this side. I am sure that hon. Members on both sides of the House are willing to assist in the promotion of legislation which will deal with rapacious landlords seeking to extract more than they should from worthy tenants, but that is no justification whatever for this House placing upon perfectly good landlords—and some do exist—the onerous burden of having to itemise all kinds of inconsequential items in order to satisfy the terms of the legislation which has been brought in by my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes.
My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Cheltenham, in moving the Amendment, said that certainly one should take note of items of some value and that they might be listed in the inventory, but that anything below the nominal value of £2 is surely not worth itemising as being part of the furniture and fittings. Does my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes really suggest that every toilet roll in the premises ought to be itemised as an important item of the furniture and fittings? Or will he accept the perfectly reasonable proposal of my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Cheltenham that what is necessary is to list items which are of substantial value? Even the figure of £2 is extremely low, and I think that my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Cheltenham has


been very modest about this, and I think that if my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes were to attempt—I am not threatening him at all—to resist the Amendment he would undoubtedly incur the displeasure of some of us.
My hon. Friend the Member for Totnes represents a constituency which attracts a very large number of people who go clown there for periods of time, and in their retirement and so on, and who may be looking for accommodation of this character. There may be constituents of his who are offering accommodation of this character for rental, with a modest charge for furniture and fittings. Certainly, that happens in my own constituency. That is not surprising because it is one of the premier seaside resorts of the country. No doubt, it also happens in Totnes.
Surely my hon. Friend does not want to place upon his constituents who are offering properties for rental and those who are seeking to rent them an almost ridiculous burden, and I would urge him to accept the Amendment.

Mr. Ray Mawby: I have a great deal of sympathy with the points which have been put forward, but I think it essential that we should understand the conditions upon which these things are being offered. If there were articles for sale on the normal willing buyer, willing seller basis, I think that all of us, no matter in what part of the House we sit, would be prepared to say that the parties would arrive at a reasonable figure fair to both the buyer and the seller. However, I would draw attention to the operative words, which indicate that all these articles are being offered
in connection with the proposed grant, renewal, continuance or assignment, on terms which require the purchase of furniture…
Therefore, whatever we may say about it, these items of furniture and fittings are being offered under a certain amount of duress, and, therefore, I believe that one must look at the situation in those terms.
If a person is buying furniture and fittings as a condition of taking on the tenancy of a flat he should at least be able, when he takes occupation, to check on a list so that he may see whether the things he has purchased are in the flat

or premises when he takes occupation. Certainly, there would be no satisfaction to the person concerned if the bag of nails he had purchased was not in the flat when he took occupation, or if the packet of safety-pins was not there. Therefore, I think that the list must be as comprehensive as possible to make certain that the person who has bought the things, under whatever conditions he bought them, should at least be able to check, when he takes occupancy, that those articles are there.
I do not think that my hon. Friends meant to give this impression, but, nevertheless, they have given it, that these are furnished premises. In fact, they are not. They are unfurnished premises, which are being let or offered for letting as unfurnished premises, and the condition is laid down that certain articles of furniture and fittings shall be part of the bargain.
Of course, there are fitted carpets and curtains which, if they were to be removed from the premises to other premises, would probably have to be cut about to be made to fit the new premises, and so would lose their value. Those are the sorts of things I am thinking of, and it is in the interests of both the landlord and the tenant that there should be between them, on a monetary basis, a change of owner of those things.
Surely it would be only in very rare circumstances indeed that the landlord or the outgoing tenant would want to sell to the incoming tenant tablecloths and teaspoons. In any case, those are articles which would tend to have the same value no matter where they were, and whether in the premises or in an auction mart. There can be a certain amount of difference of opinion over the value of a fitted carpet, and there is room for negotiation, for while the carpet is fitted in the flat it will have a higher value than when it is ripped off the floor and offered in the auction mart, because it may have to be cut about by the purchaser to be fitted into his premises.
The small items which my hon. Friends mentioned are items which would have the same value whether they remained in the premises to be let or whether they were in the auction room.
My hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East (Mr. McAdden) reminded


the House of the delightful constituency which I represent, and he said that there may be people who go down to my constituency wanting to take a short-term lease there and that they would find that this Bill would upset them. I cannot quite agree with that point of view, because those people who come to my constituency should be given a fair deal, and I believe that this Bill will certainly help to preserve Devon's good name and its high reputation for being able to look after its visitors or temporary dwellers.
My part of the country is packed with people in August, for instance, and it is far more difficult then for a person to obtain unfurnished premises for a period than it is at any other time of the year, We must make certain, therefore, that a situation is not created in which a person, just because it happens to be August, can fortuitously obtain a bigger capital sum by putting higher prices on these smaller articles when he offers them for sale. I see the point made by my hon. Friends, but the bag of nails, the packet of safety pins and the toilet-roll holders, need not necessarily be part of the articles offered for sale.
In making out his list, a landlord stipulates only what he wants to sell. There is nothing to prevent him or an outgoing tenant taking away the bag of nails and the packet of safety pins and offering them in an auction mart. On the other hand, naturally, I would not want to create a situation in which the incoming tenant had the benefit of goods left on the premises by somebody else.

Mr. David Griffiths: Has the hon. Member not seen an inventory in which the items he is now describing have appeared?

Mr. Mawby: It is quite true that they appear in inventories. If a person is bankrupt, or going into liquidation, one sees little items like that listed. One sees them even at a normal sale, but this is an entirely different situation in which a person is making it a condition of renewing or issuing a lease that the incoming tenant shall purchase certain items. It is not feasible to list all items priced at below £2.

Major Hicks Beach: Do I take it that my hon. Friend disagrees with the Attorney-General's observation, when he said that every item must be detailed and priced?

Mr. Mawby: I am not a lawyer and I bow to my hon. and gallant Friend's greater knowledge. It all depends on what is meant by "every item" That is the major point that must be considered As I am not a lawyer, I would tend to say that if the matter came to court the meaning of "item" would be decided by the court.

Mr. Doughty: Clause 1 (5) states that furniture
includes fittings and other articles".
One could not have a wider definition. It goes right down to the tin-tacks which hold the carpet.

Mr. Mawby: It would be for the court to decide. I take it that the small things would not have to be listed, and I am not thinking of the bag of nails. I do not believe that that item is even a starter. I am thinking of the price asked for fitted curtains which would lose their value if they had to be taken away and shortened to fit windows of a differensize. I do not think that the court would say that the rails holding up a pair of curtains or the right and left-hand clip on the pelmet should be itemised.
I should say that "lounge window fittings", perhaps at 10s., would be recognised by the court as an item, but the court would not expect the vendor to itemise the clips or the screws and to specify their length. That would be taking the matter to ludicrous lengths. It all depends on what is meant by "item". My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Major Hicks Beach) would probably say that my view on this is completely wrong.

Major Hicks Beach: Yes.

Mr. Mawby: I appreciate that the Amendment is put forward in good faith and I see the point that is being made, but I believe that if it were accepted it would put the landlord or the outgoing tenant in a completely impossible position in having to itemise every tiny thing. For those reasons, I ask the House to reject the Amendment.

11.45 a.m.

Mr. A. E. Hunter: I am not a suspicious-minded person, but I am suspicious of the Amendment. I believe that the hon. and gallant Member for Cheltenham (Major Hicks Beach) is a very lukewarm supporter of the Bill.

Major Hicks Beach: indicated dissent.

Mr. Hunter: The view of the hon. Member for Shipley (Mr. Hirst) that the Bill is unnecessary shows that he has a complete lack of knowledge of housing conditions in our great towns and cities. The Bill would not interfere with the good landlords, or estate agents. It aims to clip the wings of unscrupulous landlords who are charging tenants who are seeking accommodation extortionate prices for furniture and fittings of no value. The "bag of nails" argument is completely unnecessary. Why leave that item in the flat at all? The outgoing tenant would take away items of that sort.
I see no good reason for moving the Amendment. I am sure that the hon. Member for Totnes (Mr. Mawby) had legal advice from the Attorney-General's office when the Bill was being prepared. The Bill has been through Standing Committee and the hon. Member has also had help from the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government. I hope that the House will reject the Amendment.

Mr. Albert Evans: The hon. Member for Totnes (Mr. Mawby) is quite right in refusing to accept the Amendment. I had the impression from the hon. and gallant Member for Cheltenham (Major Hicks Beach) and the hon. and learned Member for Surrey, East (Mr. Doughty) that they were thinking of the rather more expensive flats where the items offered for sale to an incoming tenant would be expensive and of a great variety.
As the Bill would apply to my constituency, it would be found that the items offered for sale would be very different from those in the minds of those two hon. Members. A person who is desperately in need of rooms to shelter himself and his family will be and is induced to buy items of furniture. I have a list of typical examples a carpet, value 4s., sold at 35s., a chair, value 6s., sold at 30s., a basin and jug, value 6s., sold at £1. The people in my constituency who are subject to these extortionate demands are offered that type of furniture and fittings. If the Amendment were accepted, people in the poorer areas who have to buy sticks of furniture and worn-out carpets would be outside the provisions of the Bill. Every item,

according to the Amendment, under £2 in value need not be listed. The bed would be listed and priced, but that would probably be the only item in the room which would be listed if the Amendment were accepted.
The Bill as drafted will protect my people, the poorest people, who may be under pressure to buy these items because they need accommodation. If the Amendment were accepted the cases I have in mind, and which all too frequently have been brought to my notice, would be outside the protection of the Bill. Therefore, I think that the hon. Member for Totnes is right in refusing to accept the Amendment.

Major Hicks Beach: I still feel that this Amendment would improve the Bill, but as there is important business before us today, and as this is a comparatively small matter, I do not propose to ask my hon. Friends to press it to a Division. May I say to the hon. Member for Totnes (Mr. Mawby), however, that it is a dangerous principle to introduce Bills into the House in the belief that the courts will interpret them as he believes they should. Courts have to interpret an Act as it is drawn, and that is why faulty and impracticable legislation is so dangerous.
For the reasons I have given, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Mr. John Hobson: I beg to move, in page 1, line 20, to leave out subsection (2) and to insert:
(2) (a) If it appears to a justice of the peace on information on oath laid by any person that there is reasonable cause to suspect that an offence has been committed under this Act and that any furniture the subject of the offence is on any premises the justice may issue a warrant authorising any constable to search for the furniture and to inspect the same;
(b)any constable authorised by warrant under this section to search for any furniture on any premises may enter (if need be by force) any house, building or other place specified in the warrant;
(c)every warrant issued under this section shall be addressed to and executed by a constable who shall be accompanied by the person laying the information if that person so desires unless the justice by whom the warrant is issued otherwise directs and may also, if the justice by whom the warrant is issued so directs, be accompanied by a duly qualified valuer, the person to whom the furniture was offered and a representative of the local authority.


This Amendment seeks to leave out subsection (2) and to insert the provisions on the Notice Paper. The effect of it would be that instead of the local authority being responsible for enforcing the machinery for searching houses for evidence, the ordinary provisions of a searoh warrant would have to be gone through before any house could be entered.
I know that there are other matters which the House wants to reach so I will be as brief as possible, but I regard this as a matter of principle and of some importance. I spoke to it during the Second Reading debate, I put down a similar Amendment in Committee which was not discussed, and, therefore, I will deal with the point now.
This Amendment has nothing to do with the offence which the Bill creates. It deals only with the machinery for proving the criminal offence and for obtaining evidence as to what offence has been committed. The problem is that when such an offence is suspected to have been committed, all the evidence of it will almost certainly be upon private premises, in the possession either of the person who is alleged to have committed the offence or of some other person.
So that evidence may be obtained before a prosecution is launched, it is obviously essential that someone should go to the premises and, if necessary, force his way in. The power to search people's private homes for evidence of a criminal offence should, in my respectful submission to the House, be strictly considered and controlled, because under the provisions of the Bill as drafted it will be possible, without proper or sufficient safeguards, for representatives of local authorities to force their way into private houses and possibly to bring about a situation which might result in a breach of the peace.
I would remind the House that even a furnished houses rent tribunal has no power of entering private houses for the purpose of inspecting furniture which is the subject of any litigation before it. Therefore, we are putting strong powers into the hands of whoever might be thought proper in this case.
My objection to the Bill is that it gives far too wide powers to local authorities for this purpose. The Bill provides only

that a local authority—which, of course, must mean its properly appointed delegate for the purpose, who might be any of its servants—must have reasonable grounds for suspecting that an offence has been committed. That is not easy, because in this case the local authority must have reasonable grounds for believing that a person has offered furniture at a price which he should have known was unreasonably high.
That is a complicated piece of evidential proof and the ordinary officers of the local authority, however admirable, do not normally have the duty of considering whether they have sufficient evidence that reasonable grounds exist upon which a court might convict somebody of such an offence.
Moreover, the authority, or its official, if it should come to the conclusion that there are such reasonable grounds on information which has been passed to it, has no means of checking whether the information given is accurate or not. There is no provision that anybody has to set down the information in writing, far less on oath. It does not have to be formalised in any way, so that when a prosecution ultimately takes place the defendant cannot see whether there were proper, reasonable grounds upon which the local authority might have acted.
Then, if it thinks, either correctly or incorrectly, that it has such reasonable grounds, all it does is to give a piece of paper, with, presumably, the heading of the local authority at the top, to a person who goes to the house and presents it at the door. Anybody who challenges that is at risk of having himself committed a criminal offence, because it is a criminal offence to obstruct anyone who is lawfully authorised, whereas he might not be lawfully authorised because the local authority may have no reasonable grounds for making the order. No doubt some malicious person, who wanted for dishonest purposes to enter the premises, might have armed himself with a piece of paper from the local authority and have forged an authority which requires no particular form. but only a signature.
It is for these reasons that I think the existing provisions are dangerous and objectionable. There is an even stronger objection to them. I think that the person responsible for launching the prosecution is the last person who ought to


decide whether private premises should be forcibly entered for the purpose of obtaining evidence in support of his own case, and that we are putting the local authority, which is the prosecutor, in the position of being a judge in his own case in what is a very important step in a prosecution.
Moreover, of course, the provisions as drafted provide that 24 hours' previous notice must be given. It need only be given by post, and in the case of anybody who has committed an offence, the first thing he will do is to remove the evidence, so the entry will be fruitless and, therefore, the machinery is not very effective to effect the purpose which it is intended to procure.
I submit respectfully that the House has for many years, in cases like this, provided in a vast variety of Bills that a person who desires to force his way into private residential premises to obtain evidence of a criminal offence should get a search warrant from a Justice of the Peace, and that is all my Amendment proposes. It insists that the prosecutor, either the local authority or the person to whom the furniture has been offered, should lay an information upon oath. That would formalise the information and show whether or not there are reasonable grounds for believing that at that stage an offence may have been committed.
Then a justice of the peace, advised by a clerk who is legally qualified, can consider that evidence so formalised and can say whether in his view the circumstances are such that it is right that he should go to the length of issuing a search warrant. The search warrant is a very effective piece of machinery. That is why I recommend it. We must have provisions which bite and which are sensible and capable of being properly enforced.
12 noon.
The most important aspect of the matter is that the search warrant is given to a constable. Therefore, where entry is made, the occupier of the premises—who may know nothing whatever about the circumstances of the offence, because he may have nothing to do with it—knows that an officer is present to authorise the entry and to see that the people entering are properly there and that they will behave themselves while they are there. In addition, it is likely to prevent

argument or trouble, such as sometimes occurs when a person tries to force his way into premises.
Under the Amendment a little gang of people may accompany the police constable. There is the person who has laid the information, the representative of the local authority, and a duly qualified valuer. Very often the person laying the information will be the representative of the local authority, which reduces the number by one. It is quite useless to make an entry unless the person to whom the furniture has been offered is there in order to identify it, and a qualified valuer is there to value it.
When drafting this part of the Amendment I followed the principle of the Children and Young Persons Act, 1933. which provided that when it was necessary for people to enter premises the party should consist of somebody who knew the child, a representative of the local authority, a constable, and a medical practitioner to see what was the condition of the child. It may be that on some occasions fewer people will he required, but the Bill should be drawn in a form which enables all those who have to go to do so under the authority of a warrant, accompanied by a police constable in uniform, who will have possession of the warrant.
I do not want to detain the House, but I would point out that there are other Measures in which similar provisions for search warrants have been made. They include Measures dealing with dangerous drugs, illicit stills and spirits, and similar Customs offences, obscene publications, children and young persons, and wild birds. When hon. Members opposite were in power they passed the Salmon and Freshwater Fisheries (Protection) (Scotland) Act of 1951, which contained similar provisions, making it necessary to obtain a search warrant to enter upon private premises. Even the Deer (Scotland) Bill, recently introduced, provides that a search warrant shall be applied for.
I am sorry to have detained the House for so long, but I regard it as a matter of principle that private premises should not be forced open merely upon the authority of a piece of paper with writing on it, in the possession of a single official of a local authority, who may think that an offence has been committed.

Mr. Doughty: I beg to second the Amendment.
Before we consider the details of the Amendment we must consider the effect of the whole Bill. This is a criminal Bill; it has nothing to do with civil rights as between a purchaser and a seller of a lease or premises. Those are covered by other Acts. The Bill provides that if a person enters into a bargain which is already illegal in the civil sense he commits a criminal offence, and in dealing with criminal offences we must be extremely careful what powers we give to those whose duty it is to enforce them.
Hon. Members on both sides of the House have always been very jealous of the rights given to other people to enter upon property occupied by a third party. I go so far as to say that, with two exceptions, the House has never given a right to local authorities, as such, to enter upon the properties of other people. It is true that when health or safety is concerned—when premises are in imminent danger of collapsing, or when somebody who is suffering from an infectious disease is living in certain premises it may be necessary for people to be given leave to enter premises to save people's lives, or preserve their health. I should be prepared to support any proposal for that sort of entry.
But we are not dealing here with the question of health or safety. We are dealing with the case of a person who has entered, unwisely, or through duress —because he is short of accommodation —into an illegal bargain concerning the price of furniture. In an attempt to enforce the provisions of the Bill it is provided that a representative of a local authority can force his way into somebody's premises. I wonder whether the Clause slipped in accidentally through somebody not being careful enough when drafting the Bill. That is one reason why the Bill has experienced difficulties in its passage. A question of principle is involved.
The Bill also provides that the person who shall have power to institute a prosecution shall be the local authority, and that is the same person who is given power to enter premises by force, if necessary. That, in itself, is an objectionable provision. For those reasons the subsection should be looked at most carefully. I beg the House to realise what

it will be doing if it allows the Bill to pass in its present form. Just as in all walks of life it is no good merely to criticise, having pointed out the danger of passing the Clause in its present form it is necessary to say what should be done to ensure that the Bill should work properly, and what should be the method of enforcing a provision which makes it an offence to enter into an unconscionable bargain about furniture.
The Amendment covers the point fully. If we are to apply the criminal law, and to provide that a person may enter upon somebody else's premises in order to obtain evidence, we must be extremely careful what powers are given, and we must ensure the intervention of a justice of the peace to authorise entry. That has been done in many other Measures, as my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. John Hobson) pointed out. I therefore ask that the Amendment in its present form, or something similar to it, should be accepted, so that the owners of private property may be protected from this invasion of their property.
I pass to a more practical point of view. No one likes to have his house broken into. Some people are more irascible than others. Clerks of local authorities are not policemen or ex-policemen, and the Bill at present directly encourages disorder. A person who lives in a house and opens the front door to find somebody standing there who, without the greatest of tact, says, "I am coming in," is likely to give him an answer which, to put it mildly, is a flat contradiction, and when that happens one thing follows upon another.
Therefore, from a sensible and practical point of view, I beg the House to examine the Clause most carefully and agree that it cannot be allowed to pass in its present form. Something on the lines of the Amendment, or even on the lines of my own Amendment, should be substituted. The Bill should not make an entirely new law, as it attempts to do in its present form. This is a very important question of principle and not a mere detail which we are seeking to insert into a Bill.
I remind hon. Members, again, that once we allow such a Clause as this to co through it will be used as a precedent. and no one's house or premises will, as


of right, be safe from invasion by any official of a local authority. As I am sure that hon. Members do not wish that, I ask them to support the Amendment.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government (Mr. J. R. Bevins): I have no wish to curtail this discussion, but were I now to intervene it might be helpful, as the House has other business. There is no doubt that this is rather a difficult question, and I believe that the House is anxious to make sure that the provisions of the Bill are enforceable, and also that they are enforceable without detracting from the legitimate rights of private citizens.
The amendment recognises the need for the power of entry, but in place of the Bill's present wording it proposes, in effect, that a search warrant shall be issued by the justices of the peace; and that it is to be executed by a constable, who would normally be accompanied by the person laying the information—who might be a private citizen or a representative of the local authority—possibly by a qualified valuer, and by a representative of the local authority, as well as by the person to whom the furniture had been offered. I think that that procedure is a hit heavy handed, and goes rather too far.
We ought to remember that in the overwhelming number of cases the person in charge of the premises concerned will be perfectly ready to admit interested parties to view the premises. In the nature of the case, the premises are on offer, and the visit of the representative of the local authority involves no more invasion of the other person's privacy than would the visit of any potential tenant.
What the police constable has to do with all this is just a little obscure. I listened very carefully to what my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. John Hobson) said, but I am still not quite sure what function the police constable has to discharge in these circumstances. After all, he probably has no knowledge whatever of the value of the furniture, and his presence, like that of the person who lays the information, does not seem to serve any great purpose.
My own view is that a visit by what amounts to a deputation headed by a police constable would be far more resented than a visit, after notice being given, by a representative of the local authority. I would go a little further, and say that it seems to my right hon. Friend to be inappropriate here to involve the police at all. I also very much doubt whether the proposal in the Amendment would commend itself to my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary.
Before turning to the substance of what I want to say, I should like to comment on the existing powers that local authorities have to enter premises. They have these powers under Section 159 of the Housing Act, 1957, for certain purposes, and, under Section 78 of the Act, in the case of overcrowding, inspection can be followed by prosecution of either the occupier or the landlord. Under Section 287 of the Public Health Act, 1936, there are similar powers of entry for certain defined purposes. Those purposes include the cleansing of filthy and verminous premises, and the abatement of nuisances —both of which offences, the House should bear in mind, are liable to lead to criminal proceedings.
As I said at the beginning, I recognise that the question of the power of entry into private premises probably excites strong feeling in all parts of the House. Some of my hon. Friends dislike the idea of conferring on local authorities power of entry, following the giving of notice, in circumstances that might lead to a criminal prosecution. I think that that is the heart of their view. They feel that my right hon. Friend, and my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Mr. Mawby)—whose, Bill, of course, this is—are, perhaps, giving these powers rather too lightly in the circumstances.
12.15 p.m.
There is on the Notice Paper, Mr. Speaker, an Amendment in page 2, to leave out lines 7 to 11 and to insert:
(a) if the person entitled to possession of the premises does not agree in writing to granting the aforesaid facilities, then a local authority may apply to a magistrate for a search warrant to enter upon the said premises and inspect the said furniture.
which I understand you are not intending to call. Mr. Speaker. I will not go into great detail, but it suggests one possible alternative to what has been proposed by


my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes, and, at the other extreme, by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington.
The alternative is that instead of giving the local authority the power of entry —following the giving of notice, and so on—that is contained in the Bill, we might possibly provide that if the person who was in occupation or control of the premises did not agree to granting entry to the local authority, the authority ought to be obliged to apply to the magistrate for a warrant to enter the premises for the purpose of inspecting the furniture.
I think that that suggestion would go some way to allaying the apprehensions expressed in relation to the present provision while, at the same time, as I see it, not making enforcement of this Measure the more difficult. It would also have the virtue of being a good deal less heavy-handed and cumbersome than the procedure proposed in the Amendment—

Mr. James MacColl: In giving his provisional blessing to an Amendment that we are not discussing, the Parliamentary Secretary missed out the important words "in writing" Does he necessarily think that those words should be contained in any proposal for a compromise?

Mr. Bevins: Yes. I confirm what the hon. Gentleman says.
I am myself rather attracted by that proposal. Although the Amendment to which I have made reference was put on the Notice Paper only very recently, and I have not had an opportunity of full discussion with my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes, I should have thought that it might be possible to satisfy hon. Members in all parts of the House if we were to invite my hon. Friend—perhaps in conjunction with my right hon. Friend—seriously to examine that proposal, with a view, perhaps, to importing a suitable provision of that kind at a later stage in another place. I would hope that that would be acceptable to both sides. I think that it is a reasonable way out of what is a very genuine difficulty.

Mr. MacColl: I hope that I will not be thought indelicate if I intervene in what is rather a domestic fracas on this

Amendment, but I agree with the first half of what the Parliamentary Secretary has said. Although, on principle, one can make out a good case against the proposal in this Bill, the Amendment is akin to taking a steam hammer to crack a nut. People are quite used to having officers of local authorities, with warrant cards and powers of entry, coming to see them. Most people regard these as visits from helpful or friendly people whom they are glad to see.

Mr. Doughty: The hon. Gentleman said that people are used to having local authority representatives coming to their premises, meaning, of course, as of right. Can he tell me of any case where a local authority has power to do so except where health or safety are involved?

Mr. MacColl: I think that in both cases the visit of a local authority officer would cause much less trouble than having a police officer coming along with a search warrant. I agree with the Parliamentary Secretary there. In most normal cases people faced with a posse, headed by the local policeman, coming to inspect their carpet to decide whether or not it is worth 10s., would be much more irritated because, for better or worse, people think of search warrants and the police rather in terms of stolen goods. They would be inclined to be more irritated at having a police officer coming in. Therefore, I think, like most people, including the Parliamentary Secretary, who are fairly used to local government officials and who take a kinder view of them, that the proposal in the Bill would work satisfactorily and that there would be no trouble.
I think it is true to say that this particular operation is not concerned directly with health. On the other hand, as I said on Second Reading, a public health inspector has power to enter a house and count the number of people sleeping in a bed, which, on the whole, is rather more irritating to one's sense of privacy than having someone to look at one's carpet. Therefore, from the point of view of the ordinary citizen, I would have thought that this arrangement would work fairly satisfactorily.
Further, what one has to consider is the odd person, such as the hon. and gallant Member for Cheltenham (Major Hicks Beach), who does not like having officers from local authorities coming in


and who is anxious to stand on what he believes to be his legal rights. There might then be a risk of a certain amount of "this-ing and that-ing" ending in some kind of trouble, with the local authority officer retiring with ruffled feathers, and nobody quite knowing what the next step should be.
I must say that public health inspectors, to take one example, are very used to this kind of problem. Local authority officers are used to handling the public and getting their agreement. They have a great deal of experience of this sort of thing and of the right kind of attitude to adopt and so on. An experienced local authority officer can usually get over these difficulties.
There are, of course, cases where there might be difficulties and trouble. Therefore, it seems to me that there might be something to be said for having a sort of residual power, where some kind of forcible entry is necessary, for requiring that a warrant be obtained from a justice of the peace. I was, therefore, happy to hear the Parliamentary Secretary suggest that that might be a solution.
What I am not happy about is the use of the words:
… does not agree in writing to granting the aforesaid facilities…
That seems to me to be a hit formal and complicated. If what happens is that, in vulgar parlance, the public health inspector gets a "flea in the ear", he does riot get a "flea in the ear" in writing; the argument takes place over the threshold. I am not clear what happens then. If there has not been a refusal in writing, does he then try to put his foot in the door? I should have thought that if he were wise he would not do so. He might do one of two things. He might go away, leaving the gentlemen to cool down, and return the next day to discuss the matter; or he might want to go straight away and obtain a warrant from a justice of the peace.
Therefore, I am a little perturbed about the use of the words "in writing". That implies that this sort of situation is taking place by means of an exchange of letters. I have no doubt that if the hon. and gallant Member for Cheltenham received a letter saying that the local authority was going to send an inspector to see his carpet he would send a letter back,

because he is the sort of person who is used to writing, and would reply, "You are not coming round to inspect my carpet. I will shoot you."

Major Hicks Beach: I should say, "If you think a criminal offence has been committed you should apply for a search warrant"—and quite properly so.

Mr. MacColl: I do not think the average person involved in this kind of argument would be likely to write a letter —unless he were employing the services of the hon. and gallant Gentleman, which he would be wise to do, to write it for him. Therefore, I think this is a bit formal. I would welcome some kind of compromise on the lines suggested by the Parliamentary Secretary, but I do not think it should be in the form of the Amendment which we are not discussing.

Mr. Hirst: I am not surprised that the hon. Member for Widnes (Mr. MacColl) found some favour in subsection (2), parts of which are very good Socialism which would naturally appeal to him.
I am glad that we have had an opportunity of discussing this important Amendment which has enabled us to discuss a very important matter of principle and, if I may say so, which is not applicable only to this Bill; it applies to all the legislation which conies before this House where enforcement is involved. What I am a little worried about are some comments of my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary. I found his Second Reading speech absolutely shattering, and I am not yet happy about it. If that is the sort of guidance which the House is to get, I shall need a good deal more assistance on this Clause than I have so far had. The Parliamentary Secretary has, to some extent, indicated a little more flexibility in connection with Socialist principles which he applauded so much on Second Reading.

Mr. Bevins: There was no hint of any such principles in my speech on Second Reading. If my hon. Friend will do me the favour of reading what I said. he will find that my attitude to the whole business of power of entry was indeed very flexible. I made that clear.

Mr. Hirst: As I have not time to read the whole of my hon. Friend's speech now, I will accept his assurance, but I must say I did not get that impression


when he dealt with this Clause. It hardly fits in with his statement today. However, if he did not mean to give the House that impression, in spite of what I remember reading, I will accept his assurance.
Today my hon. Friend has certainly not made it very clear where we stand now. He suggested that people do not really mind further inroads into what used to be called the Englishman's castle —a phrase which I am afraid is getting rather worn and tattered as the years go by. I feel that we should watch this point carefully. There was a time when it was said that an Englishman's home is his castle. It is, of course, only a phrase and must not be taken too literally, but it has an important context in this matter in connection with which we are considering further methods of invasion of people's houses. It is a very different story compared with business premises, where the Food and Drugs Act and similar Acts are involved.
I hope that I shall get some help on this matter, because I am not sure that the sort of Amendment, to which I gather it is not in order to refer, will stand on its own—

Mr. Speaker: It is quite in order to refer to it. It is merely another meth 3d of achieving the purpose which the Amendment of the hon. and learned Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. John Hobson) seeks to achieve. It is in order to refer to it, but it may not be moved.

Mr. Hirst: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am not very knowledgeable on these matters, but it does not appear to me that the Amendment stands on its own. We must not leave this very important matter of principle without some assurance.
The earlier part of the Amendment standing in the name of my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Major Hicks Beach) is an essential part of any adjustment or amendment which might arise out of our discussions. It is important because we must maintain as far as we can the idea of having a warrant to prevent any Tom, Dick and Harry walking into people's houses. The idea of that being done is repugnant and I do not trust local authorities in this

degree. Some local authorities good. Some are not so good. Some are them rather like what we call Gestapo tactics, and others do not.
I would like to keep the procedure on the level of a justice of the peace issuing a warrant. He is a responsible citizen vouched for by many people long before he receives his office. There must be some statement on oath to a justice of the peace before any action of this nature is taken, whoever carries it out.

Mr. D. Griffiths: There are two types of representatives. Some representatives like going into people's houses, whether the local authority be Conservative-ruled or Labour-ruled.

Mr. Hirst: This has nothing to do with a local authority or a political party. It is the principle. I do not consider local authorities fit people to exercise responsibilities laid down in Clause 1 (2) of the Bill. No arguments that I have heard lead me to believe that they are. I am not making a political point of this. If I am assured that some form of amendment can get over this difficulty I shall be extremely happy, as it will make this bad Bill a little less bad. This is an important, fundamental matter. Whether one calls the Bill good, bad or indifferent, there is a principle at stake which transcends anything which is attempted to be enacted in it.

Major Hicks Beach: The hon. Member for Widnes (Mr. MacColl) was kind enough to refer to me as a man of action and to what I would do if anyone tried to enter my premises.
Where a criminal offence was suspected of having been committed, one would have to apply for a search warrant. I should have thought that that would have universal support from all sides of the House, unless we believe in a Gestapo State. Where matters of health are involved, it is right that local authorities should have the right of entry to make whatever inquiries are possible. The matter is as simple as that.
An important principle is involved. It is virtually a new principle, in a Bill which is likely to be of considerable importance, but if one were allowed to do any wagering in this House I doubt whether there would be a single prosecution in the course of the next two years, because the Bill is so badly worded and


drawn. Be that as it may, we have here a question of principle. Do we think that where a criminal offence is suspected the ordinary search warrant procedure should apply or not, or do we believe that the power of entry into a person's horne should be handed over to the local authority?
The Bill was introduced by the hon. Member for Totnes (Mr. Mawby), but during the course of the proceedings I sometimes wondered whose Bill it was. I feel strongly on this point of principle and I hope that we shall have a satisfactory reply on this fundamental point.

Mr. Mawby: I can understand my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Major Hicks Beach), who is very learned in the law, wondering why, at times, I bow to legal minds. It is because I know my own shortcomings and believe that the principle of the Bill is right. Naturally, I have to take a great deal of guidance and advice on the legal points raised. I join with every hon. Member in the House in regard to the importance of this matter of the right of entry into private premises. My hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Mr. Hirst) said that the Englishman's home was his castle and that in everything we do we should try and make certain that we do not extend the right of entry unless we feel that it is essential to do so.
The Amendment we are discussing is rather heavy-handed, because in these cases it is purely because of the local authority checking whether, in the view of a valuer, the list of items is correctly priced. There is nothing to prevent a local authority, without looking at the furniture and fittings, from instituting proceedings under Clause 1 (2, a). This makes certain that a local authority, before instituting proceedings, would take a competent valuer who would go in and check the articles and find out whether the prices listed were reasonable and not extortionate. In the majority of cases a local authority would send a person who would be recognised by a court of law as being competent to put a value on furniture and fittings.
When the hon. Member for Widnes (Mr. MacColl) said that if a public health officer went along and had an argument on the doorstep, I feel that it would not be the fault of the official. The local

authority would do its utmost to send a man who could appear before a court, if there were proceedings, as an expert witness who was competent to value furniture.

Mr. MacColl: My point is that the public health inspector is a person who is particularly expert in dealing with the public. He has more experience than any other local official in handling the public on the doorstep. Secondly, he is a person who is constantly giving evidence in court and is used to doing so. These officials are very resourceful people and if their emoluments were raised by upgrading I have no doubt they would take courses in valuation.

Mr. Mawby: I do not dissent from the point that public health officers perform a very valuable function, but I feel that the local authority would send someone who could be recognised as being competent. In the majority of cases no objection would be made to the person looking at the furniture and fittings. In most cases the premises would be empty.
Having said that, there may be occasions where the person concerned takes our point of view and says that the Englishman's home is his castle and objects to the local authority, in the words used by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. John Hobson), being judges in their own court. That point made a great impression on me. The organisation bringing the proceedings will also be the authority who will he allowed to do it.
I am very much taken with the points that have been made and I would tend to feel that the Amendment in the name of my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Surrey, East (Mr. Doughty) is not completely right. Not being a legal expert, I could not say that it was right. particularly where it rather puts the negative point of "does not agree". I would be inclined to put "disagree" and make it more positive.
These are small points and I accept them, and assure my hon. and learned Friend that if he were prepared to withdraw his Amendment I would do everything possible, before the Bill is complete, to make certain that this point is covered.

Mr. A. Evans: Before the hon. Gentleman leaves that point, will he be good enough to confirm that he is prepared to accept a form of words similar to those in the Amendment standing in the name of the hon. and learned Member for Surrey, East (Mr. Doughty) and the hon. Member for Billericay (Mr. Body) at the top of page 1923 of the Notice Paper? Does he agree that the words "in writing" should be in there, or would he not rather think that they were superfluous and might hamper the purpose we have in view?

Mr. Mawby: That was the real reason why I said that purely as a layman I felt that the words "does not agree" ought to be changed to "disagree". That would make the position positive rather than negative, because it is only if a person disagrees about it that we follow the next step and not the fact that the local authority has to wait until a person writes to say, "I agree to your coming."

Mr. Evans: Therefore, the hon. Member would prefer the words "in writing" were any alteration made in the Bill.

Mr. Mawby: As I say, it all depends upon what appears before "in writing". I believe that we are now getting down to the matter of words and I would certainly tend to say that the general idea of the Amendment is a good one because it at least makes certain that in many cases there will be no objection raised to the man going into the premises. Even in a case where the person feels that he is not going to have his privacy invaded by anyone at all, I think that we must alter the Bill so that he can have the right to say, "I will not grant entry unless you go to the magistrate and apply for a search warrant."That is my basic attitude towards the matter, and on that assurance I hope that my hon. and learned Friend will be prepared to withdraw his Amendment.

Mr. John Hobson: The problem with which we are dealing is not whether access can be obtained by agreement or not. If the agreement of the possessor of the premises is obtained, anyone can go in, whether he is a police officer or a representative of the local authority. What we have to provide for is when there is no agreement and when there is liable to be a dispute.
It is a difficult problem, but in view of what my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Mr. Mawby) has said and the very helpful attitude which he has adopted, and knowing that he has the promise of co-operation from my hon. Friend on the Front Bench, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

12.44 p.m.

Mr. Mawby: I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
I should like to thank all those hon. Members who have assisted me so greatly in clearing this first hurdle which every hon. Member has to get over at some time or another when piloting through a Private Member's Bill. In thanking all those who have assisted me in all sorts of ways, I should not like to leave out those hon. Friends who, by the Amendments which they put down in Committee and on Report today, have been constructive and have tried to make certain that the Bill became a better Bill. The fact that they are also hon. and learned Gentlemen has, of course, been of considerable assistance. I only hope that after the discussions which we have had on the Bill it will finally reach the Statute Book.
As I said in my Second Reading speech, the Bill does not seek to make world-shattering changes. All it seeks to do is to close up a little loophole in order to prevent the unscrupulous person oharging a premium by way of the back door. I believe that if the Bill reaches the Statute Book it will play its part, along with all the other Statutes, in seeing that the whole question of the sale of furniture and fittings is carried out as nearly as possible on a market valuation as between a willing buyer and a willing seller and will prevent exorbitant prices being charged just because the buying of furniture and fittings is a condition of a lease or tenancy.

12.46 p.m.

Mr. Hunter: Very briefly, I wish to congratulate the hon. Member for Totnes (Mr. Mawby) on reaching the Third Reading stage of his Bill and also to express thanks for the help which has been given by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government. I was sorry to hear the attack made on the Parliamentary


Secretary by one of his hon. Friends. I was in the House when the Parliamentary Secretary spoke on Second Reading. I am sure that he knows the great difficulty which people experience in obtaining the tenancies of houses and fiats, and I think that the hon. Gentleman made a very fair speech in support of the Bill, a Bill which will stop unscrupulous landlords and agents asking unfair and exorbitant prices for furniture and fittings of no value.

Mr. MacColl: The hon. Gentleman was accused of making a Socialist speech.

Mr. Hunter: If the hon. Gentleman's speech helps in protecting the people of this country from being exploited by unscrupulous landlords and agents, then I should say that it is a very good Socialist policy.
The hon. Member for Totnes spoke of the Bill as a small Bill designed to close a small loophole. I believe that it is an important Bill. The Parliamentary Secretary said that the very fact that it is known that Parliament is watching the operations of unscrupulous landlords and agents will clip their wings. I feel that the Bill will clip the wings of those who are exploiting the housing shortage in the country, and will not interfere with fair landlords or estate agents.
Everyone who takes an interest in the question of housing knows what a great social question it is. In big cities and towns people are searching for houses and flats, and often the price asked for furniture and fittings has no relation to their value. The Bill will do a good service to those seeking accommodation, and some of my hon. Friends and I have been very pleased to give our support to the Bill with a view to getting it to its Third Reading stage.

12.48 p.m.

Mr. Doughty: I also should like to join in the congratulations extended by the House to my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Mr. Mawby) on the success he is about to achieve in getting his Bill through all its stages in this House.
The hon. Member for Felt:ham (Mr. Hunter) referred to the Bill as a small Bill which clips tie wings of those who desire to obtain illegal sums of money. I want to see exactly what it does. The Bill introduces a large number of criminal

offences. Any Bill, whether a landlord and tenant Bill or a larceny Bill, which is introduced and which makes people liable to be brought before the criminal courts is a Measure which, I am sure, all hon. Members would want to examine with very great care. If they did not. they would be failing in their duty.
It is for that reason that when the Bill came before the House a number of hon. Members looked at it with considerable care and found certain details in it with which they were not at all pleased. I am sure that this is an example of the wisdom on the part of any hon. Member who brings a Private Member's Bill before the House of showing a certain amount of gratitude for its careful examination by the House. Anyone who tries to bulldoze a Private Member's Bill through the House is liable to get it wrecked on the rocks in one way or another.
I am glad that we have today achieved, on a most important principle of the Bill, a sensible concession which will strengthen the Bill very much indeed. I am speaking entirely for myself. I have always been in favour of the principle laid down in the Bill. It did not require the eloquent words of my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes, or even of the hon. and learned Member for West Ham, South (Mr. Elwyn Jones) on a previous occasion, to convince us of the extortions that were being asked. On that we all agree. What we are not agreed about are some of the matters written into this Bill, in particular the right of entry by a local authority when no question of health or safety is concerned.
Any Bill which comes before this House, whether it is a Private Member's Bill or a Government Bill, and has such words written into it will certainly secure my wholehearted opposition. I am sure that in this case there was an oversight, I know not where, but now that it has been put right the Bill has my full blessing. There are certainly matters which can be improved, and I ask the Parliamentary Secretary, purely on matters of detail, such as the question discussed this morning and not taken to a Division, whether he will look through the Bill again before it goes to another place. If I can be of assistance to him I shall be pleased to help in order to see whether, on points of detail and drafting, the Bill can


be made a better Bill to carry out the purpose we are all agreed we wish to carry out.

12.51 p.m.

Mr. Hirst: I do not want to delay the House before we leave this important stage of the Bill, but I must say that I am not quite as happy about the Bill as some hon. Members. My reason is perhaps a little different from that of the hon. Member for Feltham (Mr. Hunter). Having most carefully read the Official Report of the various stages of the Bill at which I could not be present, and refreshed my mind on them for an hour or so last night, I am still not satisfied that it will achieve anything like the objects which my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Mr. Mawby) seeks to advance.
I do not think that anyone quarrels with the purpose the Bill seeks to advance, but with whether, in fact, certain types of legislation will promote it and whether it is a good thing to introduce legislation in this House which does not promote that purpose. I agree with my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Major Hicks Beach), who has more knowledge of this subject than I have, that the Bill is not likely to achieve its object. After going through it carefully as a layman, and coming to the conclusion that it will not achieve that object, I am a little more critical of some of the things it will undeniably do, which are not necessarily so desirable.
Although I was not a member of the Committee, I appreciated the courtesy of my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes in referring to the help that he had been given in Committee. That was a piece of graciousness which I know he meant absolutely sincerely, but I cannot see that a single Amendment was accepted. Let us face the faot. There was very severe rigidity in the Committee. I regret that the Bill introduces quite distinct criminal offences, some of which are of serious import. I am not convinced that it will achieve its object any more than existing legislation which was referred to at great length on Second Reading would do, if it were operated. By way of illustration, I refer to the discussion we had on the question of control of advertisements. On that matter, my hon. Friend, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of

Housing and Local Government has certain ideas. Because local authorities have not carried out many of the powers they already have there is an unsatisfactory position. The same applies in this matter.
I regret that the Bill has been introduced in this context, not as a matter of principle. I regret that it has gone through with only one promise being made, although I agree that that is a most important promise and a most important principle. That is something for which we thank the hon. Member who introduced the Bill, and we also thank the Parliamentary Secretary for the guidance that he has given. While I am grateful for that, I am afraid the Bill shows rigidity and will not achieve its object. I can only hope that some of these matters will be looked at when further opportunities are presented before the Bill becomes an Act.
This is only the chance of ensuring that we do not make faults in our social system and, at the same time, do not achieve the aims we seek. I cannot see those aims beng achieved. Therefore, I think it a fault to introduce legislation which brings in further offences and undesirable aspects to our legislation.

12.55 p.m.

Mr. MacCoIl: I am sure that no one on this side of the House shares the misgivings of the hon. Member for Shipley (Mr. Hirst). Everyone on this side will warmly congratulate the hon. Member for Totnes (Mr. Mawby) on having taken the opportunity which the Ballot gave him of introducing the Bill and getting it through to its final stage.
The hon. Member has demonstrated the very good Parliamentary rule that one is more likely to lose a Bill by saying too much than by saying too little. Very prudently, he has kept a curb on his tongue both here and in Committee. In mentioning the Committee, may I say that we are very sorry that my hon. and learned Friend the Member for West Ham, South (Mr. Elwyn Jones) is not here today to give the support to the Bill which he gave it upstairs. Had he been here he would have wanted to say that he gave it warm support on Third Reading.
We shall see the Bill again if changes are made in another place. We shall


have an opportunity of looking at them. We shall want to look at the Amendments very carefully. If there is any whittling down of the main principles, we on this side of the House will not be very happy about that. I therefore hope that the alterations made will be kept within very narrow limits so far as the hon. Member for Totnes has any influence.
I do not share the misgiving that the Bill will not lead to a whole crop of prosecutions. I do not think that the measure of good legislation is the number of prosecutions it provokes, but the degree to which it stops offences. The Bill will be useful as a warning to people, who, quite unnecessarily, try to pile up premiums on the sales of furniture, to think twice before they do so. The fact that that will be more difficult and complicated and that there is the risk of prosecution will make them less likely to do so.
The Bill will be useful in putting some restraint on that kind of action. Therefore, on behalf of my hon. Friends, I give warm support to the Third Reading of the Bill.

12.58 p.m.

Mr. Herbert Butler: I am glad to say a few words about the Bill and to congratulate the hon. Member for Totnes (Mr. Mawby) on his tenacity and his fearlessness in facing some of his hon. Friends who wanted to destroy the Bill in Committee. As one who does not take a great part in the activities of the House, I was very interested in the activities of the hon. and learned Member for Surrey, East (Mr. Doughty). In Committee, he took a very long time to tell us that he was in favour of the Bill, but did not think we ought to discuss it. I can understand that point of view. I imagine that it is the point of view of the Conservative Party, that, if there is a shortage of houses and accommodation, owners of property should get as much as they can.

Mr. Doughty: The hon. Member was not in the Chamber when I spoke on Third Reading, or he would recollect that I put exactly the same point of view in Committee. This Bill has my blessing and

I hope that it will go through, but not in its present form. I think that it could be made a better Bill.

Mr. Butler: I am grateful to the hon. and learned Member for his explanation, but I was in the Chamber when he made his speech on Third Reading. What he said in Committee was that he was in favour of the Bill, but he and his hon. Friends did as much as possible to obstruct the Bill. It was indicated to them that if they did not want to attend the meetings of the Committee we could go on quite efficiently in assisting the hon. Member for Totnes eventually to get the Bill on to the Statute Book.
I say quite definitely that the hon. Member for Totnes, who had the assistance of some of his hon. Friends, including the Parliamentary Secretary and the Attorney-General, has done something which is opposed to the principles of the Tory Party. If there is a shortage of anything at all, quite obviously, in the view of hon. Members opposite, the person who has it for sale is entitled to get whatever he can for it.
Although we are now considering whether the power that local authorities have in this matter shall be less, and whether there shall be restriction on the part of local authorities to decide whether an offer that is made is exorbitant, nevertheless we know that the local authorities have been hampered in their activity to protect people who cannot protect themselves. In so far as the Bill exists to protect people who are in the weakest position, those of us on this side of the House certainly welcome it.
We hope that the Bill will be effective and we assure the hon. Member for Totnes that, whatever the effect of the Conservative Party's pressure on him, we welcome his conversion to the point of view that there has to be some restriction imposed on people who exploit the interests and needs of ordinary people. We welcome his activities and the Bill itself.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill according read the Third time and passed.

OBSCENE PUBLICATIONS BILL

As amended (in the Standing Committee), considered.

New Clause.—(DEFENCE OF PUBLIC GOOD.)

(1) A person shall not be convicted of an offence against section two of this Act, and an order for forfeiture shall not be made under section three thereof, if it is proved that publication of the article in question is justified as being for the public good on the ground that it is in the interests of science, literature, art or learning, or of other objects of general concern.
(2) It is hereby declared that the opinion of experts as to the literary, artistic, scientific or other merits of an article may be admitted in any proceedings under this Act either to establish or to negative the said ground.—[The Solicitor-General.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

1.2 p.m.

The Solicitor-General (Sir Harry Hylton-Foster): I beg to move, That the Clause be read a Second time.
I hope that this new Clause will be accepted by the promoter of the Bill for what it now is, a complete effort to dismiss once and for all the fears that he and his supporters have had on this topic, that in some way the kind of evidence they want to call might be excluded from the defence or otherwise in proceedings under the Bill.
I have to acknowledge that it is all my fault, because, had I been able to convince the promoter and his supporters, we would not have had to have this Clause. If I try again to explain to the House our reasons for thinking that there is no necessity for their fears, it is not because I am feeling eminent or infallible, or worthy of any of those pejorative epithets attached by us to the opponents of our propositions, but because I must not present the House with this Clause unless I make quite plain what we conceive its limitations are. I am, therefore, in no way presenting it to the promoters without indicating what it does and I hope that it will completely dispel any fears that they have.
If I may go back to first principles, I would say that the law of evidence ordinarily allows only evidence of fact, but exceptionally it allows evidence of opinion. As to when it allows evidence of opinion, I am bound to accept the general statement

from Halsbury's Laws of England, quoted by the hon. Member for Birmingham Stechford (Mr. Roy Jenkins) in Committee, namely, that "opinions of experts are gevrally admissible whenever an issue comprises a subject in which knowledge can only be secured by special training or experience."
I know of no instance in which Parliament has sought to interfere with the limited field in which the law permits evidence of opinion. In making this point in Committee, I did so in such wide terms that I stuck my neck out so as to incur the genial censure of Sir Alan Herbert against me in The Times. I do not mind that, because he has acquired a credit against me for all the enjoyment which his works have given me and he can go on drawing on it for a long time; but battered with Bardell v. Pickwick, and no doubt bloody, I am still unbowed. I insist that the essential point is true and that Parliament has never sought to change what the law lays down as the scope of the field in which evidence of opinion is admitted.
We thought—I hope that the House will take the same view—that it would be a bad precedent to alter the scope of that field by a change in the law relating to some particular subject matter. The new Clause does not do that. We make it declaratory in form, which does not matter from the promoter's point of view and keeps it innocuous in the sense in which I was talking.
What is the peril of which the promoters are afraid? There is another rule, familiar to lawyers and laymen, that neither an expert witness nor any other person can in any ordinary circumstance be asked to express an opinion on any of the issues, whether of law or fact, which a court and jury have themselves to decide. That is well recognised. I suppose that it runs on the principle that we accept that we do not have trial by experts; we have trial by court and jury.
It is said that the evidence of experts has in the past been excluded or rejected in prosecutions relating to the publication of a literary work. The answer is. "Yes they have," although I do not know of any parallel instances relating to art or science, and, indeed, the instances in which there have been such rejections are, I think, fairly thin in the history of the matter. On what principle has that


rejection been made? I have had regularly cited at me by the hon. Member for Stechford in Standing Committee and by Sir Alan Herbert in the Press, the case in which the then Sir Norman- Birkett appeared for, I think, the publishers. I thought that I might take that case to illustrate the point that I seek to make.
As I understand it, the evidence tendered by the witnesses in that case was not rejected on the ground that they were experts, or that literature was not a type of subject in which one could not acquire a state of expertise by special training or science. Indeed if hon. Members who have the OFFICIAL REPORT of the Standing Committee look at the citation of what Lord Birkett then said, as given by the hon. Member for Stechford on 18th March, it appears that a number of the witnesses whose evidence was rejected were to express the view that the work was not obscene.
Clearly, one can understand that that proposal would fall foul of the principle that we all accept, and the promoter of the Bill accepts, that neither the expert nor any other witness is to be entitled to give an opinion about the very issue that the court has to decide. No doubt under the old law there was room for the rejection of the evidence of such witnesses on that basis, and, also, under the existing law, that is, under the common law of obscene publication, it is arguable that the literary merit or demerit of a literary work is wholly irrelevant once it appeared that the work tends to corrupt and deprave, and for that reason it was decided to exclude the evidence under the law before this Bill.
The view which I wanted to present to the House is that under the Bill the position is wholly different, because in the Bill as it stands we provide the defence which we have called "of public good". Hon. Members will find it in Clause 2 (6), where they will read:
A person shall not be convicted of an offence against this section if he proves that publication of the matter in question is justified as being for the public good on the ground that it is in the interests of science, literature, art or learning, or of other objects of general concern.…
I should like to stick to literature to avoid having to mention all the other matters. I submit to the House that

this defence involves at least two principal questions. The first question to be asked is: is the publication in the interests of literature? If it is, the second question to be asked is: is it justified as being for the public good on that ground?
I conceive it that the second question —is it justified as being for the public good on that ground?—is the very question which the court or jury have to decide, and the view which I submit to the House is that neither under the subsection as it is, with the words about expert evidence in it, nor with those words out of it, would the court allow evidence of opinion to be called as to that question.
I rejoice to see present the hon. Member for Lewisham, North (Mr. MacDermot). There was some possibility that he would not be able to be here. The point which I have just mentioned was a point about which he spoke in one of the many valuable contributions which he made to our discussions in Standing Committee. We have considered all the points which he took—indeed, I have considered them personally—and I have that point in mind. The House will see that subsection (2) of the new Clause confines and makes clear the question as to which the expert evidence is to be admissible.
Turning to the other question which arises on this defence—is the publication in the interests of literature?—we have thought, and I must confess to the House that I still think, and shall always think, that no court would say that the literary merits or demerits of the work were irrelevant to the question whether publication of it was in the interests of literature, and that no court would say that literature was not a topic on which one cannot acquire an expertise in the sense of which I am speaking. If the court were to take such a view, I can imagine some uproar from the professors of literature at some of our universities.

Sir Kenneth Pickthorn: With respect, I think that my right hon. and learned Friend used one more "not" than he intended to use.

The Solicitor-General: I think that that is very likely, but no doubt it would not have appeared in HANSARD if my hon. Friend had not been alert enough to notice it.
As I was saying, it would not go very well with professors of literature if it were suggested that such expertise could not be acquired, nor do I think that any court would ever say it. That is why I urge the view to the House that it is right to believe, before any express provision is made of any kind in the Bill, that the issue raised by this new defence of public good would have the result in turn that expert evidence, evidence of opinion, would be admitted on the issue which arises under that question.
That is why I regret all the more bitterly that I could not persuade the hon. Member for Stechford and his horn Friends, in Standing Committee, that their fears were ill-founded, but at least I hope that by this new Clause we have done exactly what they want, because, in effect, we declare their fears to be unfounded and declare the law as we believe it to be. I hope that it will get rid once and for all of the fears which are sincerely held.
I may be asked why it is to be done by a new Clause. If it is right to have a declaratory evidential enactment in relation to the defence of public good in respect of a prosecution under Clause 2, we think that it must follow logically that we should have a parallel enactment relating to the destruction proceedings under Clause 3. The tidiest and most commodious way of dealing with it, therefore, was to have a new Clause to avoid repetition. I greatly hope that by taking this step we have firmly met the promoters' wishes and that we can get on with this difficult Bill. I hope that the House thinks that this is an acceptable way of finally disposing of their fears.

1.15 p.m.

Mr. Roy Jenkins: The new Clause is entirely acceptable to me and, I hope, to the House. I am grateful to the Solicitor-General and his colleagues for having felt able to put it on the Paper.
As the right hon. and learned Gentleman said, we had arguments in Standing Committee over some of the ground which he has covered today. The purpose of Parliamentary debate is to argue to a conclusion, not to argue to ultimate truth. As we are completely agreed on the conclusion, I propose to say no more

except to thank the Solicitor-General and to say that I regard the new Clause as very fair.

Viscount Lambton: I should like to repeat what the hon. Member for Birmingham, Stechford (Mr. Roy Jenkins) has said. May I add how much we all appreciate the sympathetic treatment which we received from my right hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General in Committee?

Hon. Members: Hear, hear.

Viscount Lambton: I conclude by thanking him.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause read a Second time, and aided to the Bill.

Clause 1.—(TEST OF OBSCENITY.)

The Solicitor-General: I beg to move, in page 1, line 5, to leave out "matter" and to insert "an article".
The Standing Committee decided that the Bill ought to operate not on a "matter", as it was designed to do, but on an "article". They achieved this in the oddest possible way by voting into the Bill a definition of "matter" which, hon. Members will see, consists only of articles. This has resulted in some joyous things. I hope that even as a lawyer I may draw the Committee's attention to the glorious nonsense which we have now perpetrated by that means. In Clause 3 (7) hon. Members will read:
In this section 'obscene article' means an article such that if published in any manner in which it was likely to be published, having regard to the circumstances in which it was found, the article would be obscene matter:
I hope that Sir Alan Herbert notices that. Something might be done with it.
The result is that it becomes a great deal more convenient and, we think more effective to construct the Bill on the basis of applying to "articles" throughout. The first Amendment is the first to effect that object, and I shall not have to talk about the others on the same question. For that reason, I wish to draw attention to a happy result of this process.
The hon. Member for Lewisham, North (Mr. MacDermot), in particular, will remember that we undertook to be careful that we attained the right result in seeing that words were not left in the Bill which would enable the prosecution to pick out the obscene fractions of a


matter from a book or some other object embodying a quantity of matter and base their prosecutions on it. It was everybody's desire that the work should be taken as a whole for the purpose of these proceedings, and one fortunate result of operating upon "article" instead of upon "matter" is that it enables us to be quite sure that the article has to be taken as a whole at all times for purposes of prosecution.

Amendment agreed to.

Further Amendment made: In page 1, line 6, leave out "matter" and insert "article".—[The Solicitor-General.]

The Solicitor-General: I beg to move, in page 1, line 10, after "hear". to insert:
the matter contained or embodied in".

(2) In this Act "article" means any description of article containing or embodying matter to be read or looked at or both, any sound record, and any film or other record of a picture or pictures.
(3) For the purposes of this Act a person publishes an article who distributes, circulates, sells, lets on hire, gives, lends or (in the case of an article containing or embodying matter to be looked at or a record) shows, plays or projects it, or who offers it for sale or for letting on hire.

This Amendment has separate and distinct objects. One of them is to remove the proviso at present in Clause 1 (1) so that we may replace it later with another and better proviso.

Secondly, it replaces the definition of "matter" in the Bill by a new definition of "article" and redefines the definition of "publish" in slightly wider terms. Although I do not want to occupy time unduly I must say a word about this because there are points of substance to be argued and explained about it.

I understand the difficulties of the hon. Member for Birmingham, Stechford (Mr. Roy Jenkins) when he asked us to vote the existing definition of "matter" into the Bill. The hon. Member for Stechford did not want to miss out anything which ought to be included properly in this branch of the law. He did it by putting in the long string of words which hon. Members see on line 20 of page 1, ending with the words "or other article". The result was to make it a very wide enactment. and it is difficult to think of any article which would not be included.

We have to consider how best to confine it within the realm which it would be the wish of the House to accept, and we have found it better to do it by the definition appearing on the Paper in more

This is in substance consequential. The difficulty is that it is not the article but the matter contained or embodied in the article which corrupts and depraves. That sounds silly and academic enough in relation to a book where the article is cardboard, ink and the outside cover, but it is not academic in relation to an obscene gramophone disc or an obscene sound recording script, because it is then essentially the matter embodied in it which does the corrupting. The Amendment is put down to meet that point.

Amendtnent agreed to.

The Solicitor-General: I beg to move, in page 1, to leave out lines 11 to 26 and to insert—

general terms. It is narrower than the definition now in the Bill because it does not apply to articles to be used. The words
to be read or looked at or both",
together with The provisions of the new definition of "publish", and in particular the references to articles to be shown, played or projected, seem to have given rise to strange apprehensions in some quarters, even in the august columns of The Times, which said that they sought
to bring films, gramophone records and television within the scope of the Bill.
With respect, that is a misapprehension. I do not blame anybody for misjudging these things because of the dreadful turgidity of the words which we are apt to use in finding the right form of legislation. "Film" is not in addition to the Bill; it is in line 21 now. "Gramophone records" is in no sense an addition and is in line 23. For reasons which I will explain, I do not think that in practice what we are doing will involve any peril to television.

In proposing the Amendment, we accepted the Committee's view that "publish" should include "distribute or circulate": that is to say, something not involving gain. I am, however,


speaking out of my own order and will leave that point for the moment and deal with another one first.

The Committee indicated the view that it did not want the whole of the existing common law relating to obscene publications to be supplanted by this enactment. We have accepted that view and followed it with this difference. Hon. Members who were in the Committee may remember that I expressed the view that we were anxious to avoid some of the rather absurd and awkward consequences that would follow from leaving to the common law some kinds of offence and putting other kinds of offence to be dealt with by the Bill.

The illustrations that I gave to the Committee to make the point—they may not he in the minds of the House—were that under the definition of "publish" as it now is in the Bill, one of the results would be to leave closely connected acts to be dealt with by quite different forms of law. That sentence of mine was reported in the newspaper with a capital letter to the word "acts". I hope that that will not happen again, because it makes nonsense of the point which I seek to make.

The illustrations were that under the definition of "publish" as it is in the Bill, in the case of a film the distribution of the actual reel would be an offence punishable under the Bill with the appropriate new defences available to the defendant and with the penalties that the Bill provides. On the other hand, showing the film, which is the more depraving form of the two activities, would be left to the common law without those defences and with a different set of penalties.

To take another instance, the distribution of pornographic photographs would be caught by the Bill and be dealt with in that way and the new defences would be available to the defendant. The showing of dirty pictures to a child, for instance, to evoke lust would still have to be dealt with by the common law with different penalties and these defences would not be available. We thought that that kind of result should be avoided because it would be confusing and anomalous and especially confusing to magistrates' courts. My last instance is

not an academic matter. I was surprised to learn that there are about a dozen or so prosecutions a year for that kind of offence. We have sought, therefore, to widen somewhat the definition of "publish," although we have narrowed the definition of matter."

I should like to give some further instances because, although I would be out of order in discussing it, I cannot help seeing that there is on the Order Paper an Amendment to my Amendment. It will probably save time if in explaining my Amendment I explain why the words which, apparently, are questioned have been included. Hon. Members were anxious to ensure that a speech or a joke should not be caught. Under the Amendment, they are not caught. There is no article which is published in the case of a speech or a joke. Hon. Members have been worried to keep the risk of any censorship of a live performance of a play out of the ambit of the Bill. A live performance is not caught. There is no comprehension of oral communication in the definition of "publish."

Mr. Ede: Would not the report of a speech in a newspaper be an article for the purposes of the Bill?

1.30 p.m.

The Solicitor-General: I think that would be a record, but I do not know that anybody wants to exclude that.

Mr. Ede: I am only asking the opinion of the right hon. and learned Gentleman for information.

The Solicitor-General: I presume that the newspaper or what the right hon. Gentleman has in mind would contain or embody matter to be read and, consequently, would be an article, and it would be published if it were distributed, circulated, and so on.

Mr. Ede: Most people who make speeches hope that they will be reported but are constantly disappointed.

The Solicitor-General: I share the right hon. Gentleman's misery at that fact. I am not certain that I would wish it to be applied had I had the misfortune to make a speech tending to deprave and corrupt those whom it was likely to reach. No one would worry, of course, that it might reach the right hon. Gentleman, because


he has such vast experience. All right hon. Gentleman who have formerly been Home Secretary have had to deal with such offences, and, I hope, will be sensitive to our need, while enacting this legislation, to ensure that the right classes of pornographic activity are covered.
Why do we want the words "gives" and "lends"? I was saying that the Committee had indicated that by using the words "distribute or circulate" they wanted activities covered in which the element of gain was not involved. They wanted to cover selling and to cover letting on hire. When we remove the aspect of gain, the equivalents of selling and letting on hire are giving and lending. That is why we 'thought it strictly logical, in accord with the views of the Committee, to include these words. They also serve a useful purpose when we want to deal with the single instance.
The word "distribute" has some element of multiplicity about it. It ordinarily suggests handing out a number of copies to a number of different people. The word "circulate", which also has an element of multiplicity about it, suggests the idea of passing one copy among a number of people. We want to be sure, very much on the lines of the illustration which I was giving of the person giving or showing a single dirty picture to a child; we want to keep in this Statute words to deal with that case. "Distribute" and "circulate" would not suffice to cover it.
I hope that nobody will have any fears about the use of the word "plays", because it is plainly tied by the words in brackets which precede it to the playing of sound records. It may be asked why we want the words "plays or projects" which, apparently, have given rise to alarm. We want "plays" for the obscene sound recording strip or record. In my innocence, I did not realise the importance of these dirty sound-recorded strips, but it is a matter against which one wants to keep power.
Despite the fears which have been aroused, I am sure the House will appreciate that a television performance cannot in any ordinary sense be caught. A live performance will not come within these words. I suppose it is right to say that if a person made a record of an obscene television performance and

played over the sound record and the film of the pictorial part, in that rather abstruse situation the playing or projecting of the record of the television programme could be caught by these words. It is, however, absurdly academic to think of that.

Mr. Kenneth Robinson: It is anything but absurdly academic. Clearly, the Solicitor-General has not heard of video tape, which is becoming more and more the normal method of transmitting a television programme. It is extensively used in America and already is extensively used in commercial television in this country, and, no doubt, will spread to the B.B.C. The programme is recorded on video tape, perhaps, days before and then transmitted at the advertised time. Clearly, on the right hon. and learned Gentleman's showing, a performance of that kind would come within the ambit of this wording.

The Solicitor-General: Certainly, it would. I am obliged to the hon. Member. I meant academic, however, in another sense. I explained to the Standing Committee upstairs, and I hope that my assurance was accepted, that no device was being made here to create some new kind of film or television censorship. There is no intention of using anything of the kind.
What we want to do is, rightly, to meet the known evil of projecting deliberately a pornographic film in a cellar, a cabaret or club, or that kind of place, in private circumstances, which is a profitable pornographic activity. It would not be right to leave that to the common law with the unhappy and anomalous result which I indicated earlier, that the penalty and defences in relation to distribution are dealt with by one branch of the law and the penalty and defences in relation to projection or playing of the sound part of it are left to another part of the law. That is a dangerous difficulty to create for the courts in administering the law, and particularly the magistrates' courts. That is why we have to this extent, and for no more sinister purpose, suggested that we should widen the definition of "publish" in the Bill.

Mr. Niall MacDermot: Will the right hon. and learned Gentleman help the House a little further by giving more information about the dozen or so prosecutions of this kind


which, he says, are taking place every year? What sort of offences are they? What sort of charges are being brought? That is something which would help us considerably, because part of the objections that were raised on this point were based on the belief that this part of the common law was largely a dead letter.

The Solicitor-General: I think I misled the hon. Member. I cannot offhand give more information that I have given. If the House will give me leave to speak again, I will, however, try to get instructions. The precise topic of which I was speaking was the kind of offence which consists of an individual showing "dirty" pictures to children to corrupt or arouse lust, I was speaking of that and not of a cinematograph display in this context. I was speaking solely of the handing of the "dirty" picture to a child. It is that type of prosecution, the publication of an obscene libel in that context, of which, I am told, there is a dozen or so a year.

Mr. A. J. Irvine: I should like to intervene on the limb of the Solicitor-General's argument which dealt with the question of narrowing the definition of "article." The right hon. and learned Gentleman's propositions were, as I understood, under two heads. The first dealt with the widening of the term "publish" in the Bill and the other the narrowing of the term "article" He said, as I understood, that the definition of "matter" under the Bill was too wide and that as a matter of language and exact formula the proposed wording was preferable.
The Amendment in the Bill was a consequence of the treatment of this matter in Standing Committee, and the right hon. and learned Gentleman made the point that the definition of "matter" contained a succession of particular items as part of the definition and then ended with the words "sound recording or other article." He said that it was difficult to conceive of any article which would not come within that definition. He put that forward as a reason why the wording now proposed was preferable.
Does not exactly the same objection apply to the definition of "article" in his Amendment? Can he or any other hon. Member think of any article which

does not contain or embody matter to be read or looked at, or both? I should have thought that exactly the same criticism and objection applied. I suppose that in this age of marvels it is just possible to manufacture an article which is too small to be looked at, but unless that is true, and unless one gives the draftsmen the benefit of that doubt, it would seem that the Solicitor-General has adopted language which is all-embracing and which includes every article known to man. In that respect—I do not say that it is true in all respects—the definition in the Amendment shows no improvement upon the definition of "matter" in the Amendment passed in Standing Committee.

Mr. J. Grimond: The last thing that I want to do is to delay this admirable Bill, but, not having had the advantage of sitting in Committee under the guidance of the hon. Member for Birmingham, Stechford (Mr. Roy Jenkins) and the Solicitor-General, should like to ask one question about the Amendment. We are all under the shadow of Sir A. P. Herbert and we must be careful of the language which we use.
I do not entirely share the fears of the hon. and learned Member for Liverpool, Edge Hill (Mr. A. J. Irvine). The words "to be read or looked at" imply that this is the particular purpose of the article in question. I can think of many articles which are much better not read or looked at and it has never been suggested that that is their main purpose.
I have no doubt that there is a simple answer to it, but what is the necessity for the words
and any film or other record of a picture or pictures"?
I find it difficult to see what those words add, because I should have thought that anything which came under that heading was covered by the words in the earlier part of the Amendment, namely,
any description of article containing or embodying matter to be read or looked at".
Surely those words cover
any film or other record of a picture or pictures".

Mr. Ede: On a point of order. The Solicitor-General began by pointing out that what he means to leave out in this Amendment includes two things—the proviso to subsection (1) and subsection


(2) which he reimposes in the words which he proposes to insert. He then said that another Amendment dealt with the reenactment of the proviso to subsection (1). Could he say which of the Amendments is supposed to do that, and may we take it that we are discussing that Amendment with the one now under discussion? Otherwise, we may strike out these words and then not like the words which he proposes to insert in substitution.

1.45 p.m.

The Solicitor-General: The further Amendment to which I made reference was the one in Clause 2, page 2, line 34, to add a further subsection. What the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) says is quite right I did not appreciate that I would be allowed to discuss that Amendment with this one, but if the Committee and you, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, think that that is the right course, I should like to ask leave to do so.

Mr. Ede: On a point of order. Is it not a fact that on Report a Minister is entitled to speak more than once without asking leave?

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I do not think so. The right hon. and learned Gentleman is not in charge of the Bill. I understand that the hon. Member for Birmingham, Stechford (Mr. Roy Jenkins) is in charge of the Bill.

Mr. Roy Jenkins: Perhaps I may help the House by saying that, while I and some of my hon. Friends think that the Amendment moved by the Solicitor-General is rather wide, we think that the best thing to do is to move on to the Amendment to the Amendment, which I understand you will call, Mt. Deputy-Speaker, so that the discussion can be more closely focussed.

Question, That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Bill, put and negatived.

Question proposed, That the proposed words be there inserted in the Bill.

Mr. Roy Jenkins: I beg to move, as an Amendment to the proposed Amendment, in line 5, after "sells" to insert "or."
Perhaps it would be convenient to take with this Amendment the Amendments after "lets" to insert "it," and to leave

out from "hire" to the third "or" in line 6.
The Amendments touch on the only controversial matter still outstanding between the promoters of the Bill and the Government. They concern the scope of the Bill. Originally, as the Title of the Bill indicates, the promoters were anxious that the Bill should be concerned only with publications, as the word is commonly understood.
The desire of the Government, which they put forward in the draft Clauses for consideration in Committee, was that the scope should be widened and that the Bill should replace the whole of the common law relating to obscenity. We were reluctant to accept that desire, and it might clear the mind of the House if I give straight away the two reasons why we were reluctant to go as far as that and the two doubts which we have about going too wide.
First, the common law at present covers obscenity in every possible aspect, from a speech, a conversation, a chance joke, a lecture, to a film, a play, a television performance, a book—almost anything that one can think of. To the extent that all those subjects are covered in the Bill, it may be said that it is not an extension of the law of obscenity. We take the view that there is a difference between having a perhaps rather archaic bit of common law and enshrining it afresh in a Statute in 1959. We thought that to set up a new law of obscenity for films, plays or television shows, even though we were merely taking it out of the common law and putting it in Statute form, may possibly give a new cutting edge to a law which, over the years, has lost its cutting edge.
We are anxious, so far as possible, to confine ourselves to the matters with which we were originally concerned in bringing forward the Bill. We thought, possibly presumptuously, that in presenting the Bill we knew something about those who were concerned with the written word and associated matters. We had heard their views. We knew the difficulties. We knew what they wanted. In the Select Committtee, we heard a great deal of evidence. We have not concerned ourselves in any way with a range of other subjects, such as stage plays, television performances and films. We have given no opportunity to the


parties interested in those matters to make their views and possible difficulties known to us. We were very doubtful, very hesitant indeed, about legislating by the back door, as it were, for a whole range of subjects on which, quite honestly, we did not feel competent to legislate. Therefore, we wanted to keep the issue as narrow as possible. We sought to keep it to publication only.
The Government, in the Standing Committee, sought to extend it to the whole field. We put in a new definition which went some way to meet the Government's point of view, a definition which went some way certainly from the draft of the Bill as originally presented to the House on Second Reading. I think that it can best be summed up by saying that it covered the whole field of tangible objects. We put in photographs and sculptures—"novelties" as, I think, they are called in the trade that the Solicitor-General was so very concerned about in Committee.
We also put in sound recordings, and we also put in films in the sense that films have a tangible quality. We put in films in the sense that somebody sells them to another person. We did not put in films any more than we put in television shows in the sense that they are shown to the public.
This may be said to be illogical, but, of course, we have been up against illogicality all the time that we have been dealing with the Bill. After all, corruption comes not from selling a book but from somebody reading a book. Therefore, this is not absolutely logical. Our purpose, as far as possible, was not to concern ourselves with matters on which we did not feel competent to legislate, and not to build up the possibility of a new censorship on a wide range of activities on which we had no desire at all to legislate.
We are worried about the new Government definition, which, admittedly, is an improvement on the definition they wanted in Standing Committee but which was rejected by the Standing Committee. We are worried about it on two grounds. First, "gives, lends" is rather a serious matter. We had evidence before the Committee that the police would never, for instance, concern themselves with private libraries, but, suddenly, one has got very near to the position in which

there might be an invitation to do so, when somebody lends a book from his library to another person, and the police may wish to behave in—what shall I say? —in some way perhaps not envisaged now—I am sure, not envisaged by the Solicitor-General—but which might happen.
We could then have a situation arising in which one person lends a book from his private library to another and so may be leading to a criminal offence. I am quite sure that no one wants that to happen. I am sure that the Solicitor-General will say that that is not his intention at all, but, as everyone knows, when we are legislating in the House we must have regard to the words which we put into the Bill, and not to the intentions of the Law Officers or any other Member of the House. There is only too much experience to show that it is words, not intentions, which count.
The classic example of this is when the Obscene Publications Act, 1857, was going through the House of Lords. Lord Campbell was trying to reassure Lord Lyndhurst, who had not been a notably liberal Lord Chancellor, but who, on this matter, was relatively liberal. There was a very sharp personal quarrel between Lord Lyndhurst and Lord Campbell about it. Lord Campbell said—I am freely quoting him now, but this was the sense of what he said—"It is inconceivable that this Act could be used against books which have any literary merits whatsoever". It is quite clear from what has happened over the last 102 years that Lord Campbell's words have proved not to be the governing factor in the matter.
Therefore, we must have regard to the words, not intention, in considering the words "gives, lends". Frankly, we feel extremely worried that they may lead to gross interference with the rights of private individuals. I think, therefore, that the House should feel able to dispense with these words.
Then there are the words "shows, plays or projects." Again, we do feel considerable doubt about those. We do not want to introduce the possibility of a film censorship. We do not want to introduce a sort of long stop behind the Lord Chamberlain. I am not absolutely sure whether a play is not treated as an illegal show when we say "plays or projects it". I am not sure that would not


cover the performance of a play upon the stage. My hon. Friend the Member for St. Pancras, North (Mr. K. Robinson) raised the question of the way in which the showing of television performances has been extended and would be covered by these words, and I am afraid there is the danger here of extending the Bill to new fields to which we do not desire to extend it. I think that the Government would be ill-advised to do so.
Let us not take the view that by excluding these matters we are leaving great loopholes for pornographers. After all, the common law will still remain. What is excluded from the Bill remains subject to the common law. The common law has existed for a long time, and, presumably, has enabled the Government to take what action they want. Had it not been through the promoters of the Bill the common law and nothing else would be the law covering this matter. It has not been on the initiative of the Government that an advance has been made forward from the common law.
I would hope very much. therefore, that the Government will feel able to meet this point by accepting our three Amendments to their Amendment for restricting the scope of the Bill and for resting on the common law in other matters.

Sir Leslie Plummer: I beg to second the Amendment.
I wish to make some points which I hope the Solicitor-General will receive as sympathetically as he has received most other points which we have raised with him recently. We have made it quite clear that the promoters of the Bill have no desire in any way to aid the trader in pornography in his work, and the Amendments to the Amendment are not directed to making the task of that gentleman any easier than it is today. I must say, however, that it seems to me that what is now envisaged is taking action which would put the perfectly innocent person in the role of the trader in pornography.
In saying that, I refer to the word "lends" in the Solicitor-General's Amendment. In the Select Committee, I asked the authorities what action they took over the disposal of libraries containing what are advertised by the rather odd term as "curious and rare books". The Solicitor-General, who is a fairly

naive person in these matters, would not understand the true significance of those words, but they are well understood by the gentlemen in the trade. They would not, of course, be regarded as pornography, but they bear an honoured name in the auctioneering world. Nevertheless, books falling under this description are sold at auctions, and disposed of in one way or another. The police made it quite clear that there is no concern with that sort of thing at all.
Suppose, however, a man inherits a library which contains some of these books described as curious and rare, and suppose that he lends one of those books to a friend of his and that person in turn leaves it lying around his house so that it falls into the possession of somebody else. Is not that person being made subject to police action?
A man may inherit such a book, and it is not outrageous for a man to have it who does not deal in books of that sort. A man who does not deal in books of that sort may have such a book in his possession. He may have inherited it; he may even have bought the thing some years ago; he may have acquired it on a pleasure trip to Paris, thinking it had great literary merits; and, indeed, it may have. He is not dealing in it, but he lends it in a casual way to another adult, intelligent person. Surely it is not the wish of the Solicitor-General that that man should be put into peril of any sort because of these words in the Amendment, when the man might like to sell the book at auction, and we know quite well that the police would have no objection at all?
This may seem a small point, but there is a question here of putting innocent people in peril, and for this reason I beg to second the Amendment to the Amendment.

2.0 p.m.

Viscount Lambton: I should like to support the two speeches just made and to consider especially the words "gives" and "lends" for a reason which has not yet been mentioned. What my right hon. and learned Friend desires—indeed, what we all desire—is to penalise those who make profit out of the purveyance of pornography in one sense or another. If one gives or lends a book, how can one make any profit out of it? There is great


danger that penalties could possibly be—I do not say would be—laid upon people who would make no profit out of the transaction. I hope that my right hon. and learned Friend will allow the Amendment to go through in the hope that it could be corrected in another place so as to provide that the giving or lending which entailed profit to a person who pretended to give or lend should become the legal phraseology.
As has been said, there could be nothing so ridiculous as the owner of a library who gives or lends a book, the contents of which he does not know, finding himself prosecuted and brought before the courts. The criterion should be whether a profit was made out of the transaction. Since there is no mention whatsoever of a profit in my right hon. and learned Friend's Amendment, I suggest that is a matter which could be considered and, in all probability, remedied in another place.

Mr. John Strachey: . I want to ask the Solicitor-General to clear up one point which would, I think, decide my view on this matter. I have been very much impressed by the last two speeches made.
Prima facie, it seems obvious that we intend to confine these pains and penalties to commercial transactions which have the aim of gain for somebody, which I believe to be right. The Solicitor-General asked, "What about the instance of a man who shows a dirty postcard to a child? Would it not be very wrong to exclude him from the pains and penalties of the Bill?" The Solicitor-General went on to say that there are some half-dozen prosecutions for this type of offence today. But does not that destroy his argument for including that in the Bill?
Is it not better that these offences should come under the common law, as he himself says they do quite satisfactorily today, rather than that we should put into the Bill something which, on other grounds, is decidedly objectionable, as I think it has been conclusively explained to us?
If we were concerned directly with the man who shows dirty postcards to a child, we should be convinced by the Solicitor-General's argument and we shoud be forced to make some provision of that kind in the Bill, but surely there

is no substantial objection to one type of offence being caught by the Bill and the other being caught by the common law. Is not that the more satisfactory solution?

Mr. MacDermot: The Solicitor-General has shown himself so open to persuasion during the various stages of the Bill that we are all very grateful to him. I hope that he will continue to be open to persuasion if we can use sufficiently persuasive arguments. The right hon. and learned Gentleman has already made it clear that Ihe has come a substantial way to meet us. The main question of principle which divided us has gone. As he argued in Committee, he wanted to abolish the common law in this field and replace it by statute law. We who took a different view argued that if that were done we feared that it would have the effect of stimulating and provoking prosecutions in a field in which we believe the common law to be largely a dead-letter.
We did not want to see that happen. Therefore, we thought that this new statute law should be confined to those evils and mischiefs which existed, and about which there were difficulties in the existing law as was seen in the evidence placed before the Select Committee. That difference in principle has now gone. The Solicitor-General now concedes that there are classes of activity which should not be brought within the ambit of the Bill but should be left to the common law. The most important, perhaps, is any kind of live performance. I share the anxiety expressed by my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Stechford (Mr. Roy Jenkins) whether on the present wording the Government have succeeded in achieving that object.
The manuscript of a play is an article. It sems to me very possible that a court might hold that a live performance of that play was a playing of the play and that that was covered by the word "plays". Equally, one speaks of a "theatrical show", and it could be said that a live production "shows" the play. Perhaps that is a question merely of drafting and the wording could be looked at further.
It was gratifying to hear the Government accept that live theatrical performances should be excluded, because


at was the matter which was concerning us most. If the Government accepted that, if would mean that there would be no precedent left in the reported cases in the textbooks of any publication of an obscene libel in the sort of activity which the Solicitor-General now wants to bring into the Bill, for example a film show.
In Committee, when we argued this matter, the Solicitor-General drew my attention to two cases and a textbook. The first case, Curl's case, decided at the beginning of the eighteenth century, was concerned not with a theatrical performance but with the publication of obscene written matter. The language used in that case was so exceedingly wide that I do not believe that the Solicitor-General would attempt to defend it as a true statement of the common law today. It was accepted by the then Lord Chief Justice that any kind of publication which attacked religion would be an offence against the common law. Clearly, that case was stating the common law in terms which were far wider than anything we find today.
The second case was the Saunders case in 1875. It concerned an indecent exhibition in a booth on Epsom Downs during Derby Week. That was held, without much argument or evidence to support it, clearly to constitute an offence against the common law. On the Solicitor-General's own concession now, that type of case would not come within the Bill as he proposes it should be amended.
The result would be that, as regards the decided cases, there would not be a single case to support it as far as I have been able to ascertain. The right hon. and learned Gentleman has told the House that there are a dozen or so prosecutions a year taking place which would fall within the kind of wording he wants in this Bill. My own view is that if these are limited to the kind of cases about which the Solicitor-General has told us—someone showing dirty postcards or obscene photographs to small children —it would be better to leave those to the common law, because this is analogous to various other common law offences not covered by this Bill.
Such offences as indecent exposure, indecent assault, are dealt with by the common law, and it does not seem to

me that there is any necessity to disturb the existing common law practice on this matter, since it has not given rise to any difficulties. It was not referred to in the proceedings of the Select Committee from start to finish. It was not referred to in Committee. Until the Solicitor-General told us about it this morning I do not think many hon. Members were aware that it was going on. So it seems to me that we can leave well alone there.
The Solicitor-General argues for the words "gives or lends" to cover the case of the distribution which is not for gain but is only a single instance. It is only right to point out to those of my hon. Friends who have been objecting to the idea of distribution which is not for gain coming within the ambit of the Bill, that in the second line of page 2 it is made clear that publication shall be an offence under the Act whether for gain or not. No objection was taken in Committee nor in this House to those words, so I feel that, if we are to oppose the Solicitor-General, this is not the principle on which we should do so.
I would take up the right hon. and learned Gentleman precisely on the distinction which he pointed out exists between his wording and the wording we are arguing for by this Amendment. The right hon. and learned Gentleman says that the words "distribute" and "circulate" carry with them the idea of a multiplicity of publications, whereas "gives or lends" would cover the single case. I would suggest respectfully to the House that this is precisely the distinction we ought to draw. Throughout this legislation we are aiming at those who are trading in pornographic matter—I am not dealing with the question of gain or otherwise for the moment—in substantial quantities. It does not seem to me necessary to bring within the ambit of the Bill the odd, individual case, whether it be the example of someone lending a novel to a friend or whether it be the passing of one of those fairly harmless but obviously obscene little pieces of paper which someone shows another in a public house. We ought to confine the Bill to the major traffic in this kind of work.
There is a final point in this connection, namely, that we see on the Amendment Paper that it is the intention of the Solicitor-General later today to move an Amendment which would leave out the


provision in the Bill requiring the consent of the Director of Public Prosecutions to prosecute. If that Amendment is to be accepted, as I understand it may be, then it seems to me that it is more important than ever to tighten the scope of this Bill, because we do not want private individuals to initiate prosecutions on trivial matters under this Bill or to be encouraged to do so by our having included those words within it.

Mr. Ede: It is with great regret that I dissent from the views expressed by my hon. Friends on this side of the House and by the noble Lord the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Viscount Lambton) in respect of this Amendment. I do not think we are aiming merely at the question of profit in this Bill, and I was surprised to find that the noble Lord thought there was something wrong in making a profit.

Viscount Lambton: Out of obscene matter.

2.15 p.m.

Mr. Ede: I think the offence is obscenity and not making a profit. We have to face the fact that this Amendment is aimed at protecting the rather wealthy person who shows to young people either books or pictures of an obscene character, not for profit but for the titillation he gets out of seeing the reaction in the minds of the young people. When I was Home Secretary I was approached by the then Chief Scout on the difficulty he found on occasion in scout masters who were engaged, not the whole time but as opportunity afforded, in the corruption of young people, not for profit but for such titillation as they got out of the reactions of the young people.
Everyone who has been connected with our education service knows the problems that arise from the circulation of indecent matter among young people, not for profit. Let us face the fact seriously that there are wicked people in this country who delight in the corruption of youth. For the first time in my experience the Amendment moved by the Solicitor-General is a declaration by the authorities of the country against such a practice. It did not matter so much in the days when the mass of the population were illiterate, but one of the responsibilities that falls on a State which insists on

everybody being literate is that it has to take steps to guard against the abuse by wicked people of the opportunities for corruption that this state of affairs creates.
I am well aware that my hon. Friends will all say that they are as vehement in their condemnation of the practice I have described as I am. It has been suggested that because an ancestral library contains a book which, by modern standards, might be obscene, and the owner of the library lends that book, he may be in danger of prosecution. I should have thought that prosecution would arise only if the person to whom he lent the book felt offended at having been regarded by the owner as being a person likely to be amused or titillated by the book. I do not see why, merely to protect the ducal owners of these ancient libraries, we should object to the Amendment moved by the right hon. and learned Gentleman, and if he resists the Amendment, although I always regret voting against Amendments moved from this side of the House, I shall feel that on a Private Member's Bill I am entitled to support even the Solicitor-General.

Mr. Robert Jenkins: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. Having regard to the vital nature of this discussion, and there being very few Members present for this issue, may I call your attention to the fact that there are not forty Members present?

Notice taken that 40 Members were not present;

House counted, and, 40 Members being present—

2.20 p.m.

Mr. Grimond: We have all listened with the greatest respect to the right hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede). As he suspected, I do not think that anyone would dissent from his desire to stop the use of filthy literature for the perversion of the young, but in spite of what he said I would support the proposed Amendment to the Government Amendment on the ground that, however admirable his purpose, the Bill is not the place to put the provisions of the Government Amendment into effect. First, I find its wording rather obscure. Secondly, the right hon. Member for Dundee, West (Mr. Strachey) raised a powerful argument


when he pointed out that if there were a danger of literature being used for per. version could be dealt with by the common law.
It seems to me that if we include the words "lends or… shows" we shall make the provision far too wide. Friends across the Atlantic have sent me a copy of Casement's diaries. It is conceivable that these may fall within the purview of the Bill. If the Bill becomes law, as I understand I should be committing an offence if I were to show the book to the Solicitor-General. It cannot be the intention that it should be an offence merely to show a book which might conceivably come under the purview of the Clause.
It may be said that the police would never prosecute in such a case, but as the hon. Member for Birmingham, Stechford, (Mr. Roy Jenkins) pointed out, this argument has been the downfall of many valuable enactments. and I do not think that the House should agree to a provision of this sort when, on the face of it, it could be used for a purpose which the House could not possibly approve.

Mr. John Hobson: My experience of obscenity is not extensive. Nevertheless, I recollect that in one of the few cases of this nature in which I was concerned the court had before it an enormous quantity of photographs which a gentleman thought might prove salacious and of interest to people who got in touch with him. He had no system of distribution, and he was not circulating the photographs. It was merely a case of those lucky enough to get in touch with him having the photographs sent to them, so that they could enjoy, in their own way, the obscenities to be derived from a series of most disgusting photographs.

Viscount Lambton: Would not that person be liable to prosecution under the common law?

Mr. Hobson: I should have thought not, but if that is so, the grounds of my opposition to the proposed Amendment to the Amendment fall by the wayside.

Mr. Roy Jenkins: Did not the gentleman in question sell the photographs, even though he did not distribute or circulate them?

Mr. Hobson: No; he neither sold them nor circulated them. He used to hand

them to somebody and allow him to keep them for a few days, the object being that it would lead on to other things. It was usually the introduction to some physical association. In those circumstances, he was lending the photographs as an introduction to other matters.

Viscount Lambton: Cannot the Solicitor-General state whether such action would be liable to prosecution under the common law?

Mr. Hobson: I leave that for the Solicitor-General to deal with as he thinks fit. I thought it right to draw that sort of case to the attention of the House, as it is obviously something which may require to be covered and perhaps would not be covered either by the common law or by the Bill if the proposed Amendment to the Amendment were accepted.

The Solicitor-General: I hope that by gently cheating against the rules of order, with your leave, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, I may contrive, in replying to the hon. Members' Amendment, to answer as well some of the ingenious questions which arose on my Amendment.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: The right hon. and learned Gentleman is not obeying my Ruling. He did not move the Amendment himself. Therefore, he has to ask the leave of the House to speak again. He is not in charge of the Bill.

The Solicitor-General: But this is the first opportunity that I have had to reply to the Amendment to my Amendment, Mr. Deputy-Speaker.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I am sorry. I am wrong.

The Solicitor-General: That is not surprising, with so many different aspects to be covered.
Fortunately, some of the problems put to me have fortunately been answered already. The hon. and learned Member for Liverpool, Edge Hill (Mr. A. J. Irvine) mentioned the width of the definition of "article", which I propose to incorporate in the Bill, in comparison with the definition of "matter" which is already in the Bill. The answer to the hon. and learned Member's point was given by the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond). If the


hon. and learned Member will contemplate, with humility, a tablespoon, not of particular artistic merit, he will agree that it is difficult to say what is an article to be read, looked at or shown, although I dare say that a burglar may have glanced at it from time to time. One could hardly imagine any sane court being asked to construe the word "article" in that context, as comprising an object of that kind.

Mr. A. J. Irvine: The right hon. and learned Gentleman will agree that it is often wise to have a look at such an article.

The Solicitor-General: It is not made to be read, looked at or shown.
The hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland bowled a rather faster ball at me, which I find rather intriguing. He asked why it was necessary, after talking about
any description of articles containing or embodying matter to be read or looked at or both…
to bother to deal with
any film or other record of a picture or pictures.
I hope that he will not think that this is all my ingenuity, but those who advise me make the point that a film is not an object primarily to be looked at. It is what the technicians call a transparency. it is the presentation of the film which is looked at. That is why we have to wander into this strange realm of words.
I was surprised to hear my noble Friend the hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Viscount Lambton) going back on the words "whether for gain or not." I thought that we had all worked on the basis that whatever kind of offence we were dealing within the Bill it was to be dealt with whether there was or was not any question of gain. I do not think that we should run away from that criterion now.
What is at issue between the Government and the supporters of the proposed Amendment to the Amendment is the point at which we are to draw the line between offences to be dealt with by the common law and offences to be dealt with by the Bill. There is no other issue. If the hon. Member taunts me with not having legislated in this field I hope that he will not pursue the matter, because he

has had a jolly good run with his Amendments, thanks to his persistency, upon which I congratulate him.
We are now promoting a new Bill which, on the borderline between the operation of the Bill and the operation of the common law, we fear may cause confusion if courts have to apply one law to one and another law to another of a series of closely connected acts in the form that I have explained. It is solely upon the ground that a new Bill of this kind creates these complications that we have thought fit to widen the definition of "publish."

Mr. Donald Chapman: Can the Solicitor-General say whether the common law is adequate to. deal with cases that have been mentioned?

The Solicitor-General: It is not part of my case that the common law is not adequate to deal with these matters, but I explained that the result of accepting the view of the Standing Committee, that we should not substitute this Bill for the entirety of the common law, is that we get a dividing line between the two. The important thing, we think, is to get the dividing line at a point where it will not, in practice, create complications and difficulties in the magistrates' courts that have to administer it. It is on that ground, and for the reasons I have given that I ask the House to look favourably on the Amendment as it stands—

2.30 p.m.

Mr. A. J. Irvine: Would the Solicitor-General be kind enough to deal with the case raised by his hon. and learned friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. John Hobson)? That seemed to present a very fair example of the kind of case that creates a difficulty in the minds of many hon. Members here. In the circumstances referred to by his hon. and learned Friend, is it the right hon. and learned Gentleman's view that the offence would be prosecutable?

The Solicitor-General: I am not sure that I was sufficiently attentive to the facts of my hon. and learned Friend's case, but I do not imagine that any display or distribution—or rather, publication—in the strict sense of dirty photographs cannot be caught by the common law in its present form. No one is


suggesting that. The difference between us is whether it will not be difficult for the courts to remember that if we are dealing with the distribution of photographs, that has to be dealt with on the basis of this Bill, whereby certain defences would be available and certain penalties applicable; but that if we are dealing with the showing, or the handing out, or the giving of, or the lending of a dirty photograph, it has to be dealt with under a different form of law, with different penalties and without those defences. We do not want to put magistrates in that difficulty.
Perhaps I may give an illustration. One keeps learning, and I learned only recently—indeed, only when my hon. and learned Friend was speaking—that one of the instances they get is the gentleman —I should not say "gentleman", but the person—who goes round putting dirty photographs in the baskets of schoolgirls' bicycles. One does not think of the joys of these things—it is, perhaps, a rather Epicurean form of pleasure.
It is important, I would have thought, to be well armed against that person, and we would be well armed against him by the hon. Member's Bill as he had it, because the man would be distributing photographs. Do we really want to have different defences and different penalties for a person who, instead of putting these things into schoolgirls' bicycle baskets during his round in the morning, hands one photograph to one little girl in equally unpleasant circumstances—perhaps in a room, or elsewhere? We do not think that we should complicate the magistrates task by putting a dividing line between the two matters—

Mr. Roy Jenkins: Would not "distribute" still apply, even if our Amendment to the Solicitor-General's proposed Amendment were accepted?

The Solicitor-General: I do not run from that. The question is whether I would be right in saying that it would be a complication for the magistrates courts to have to remember that if dealing with the distribution of dirty photographs, or the circulation of one dirty photograph, they must apply one set of law, and when dealing with the handing out or showing of one dirty photograph they must apply another form of the

law. We do not think that that is right.
The hon. Member for Deptford (Sir L. Plummer) raised a rather alarming proposition about one of his friends. I do not put it upon him, so let me say that I myself might lend to a friend a book, that friend might leave it about, his children might see it, and I, the lender, in all innocence, would be caught by the provisions of the Bill—that is, if my Amendment is allowed to remain as it stands.
I would suggest that while that is a possibility, it is a very remote one when we remember the test of obscenity. By that test, this article is to be deemed to be obscene
…if its effect… is, if taken as a whole, such as to tend to deprave or corrupt persons who are likely, having regard to all relevant circumstances, to read…
the matter contained or embodied in it.
I have to take into account for this purpose—and perhaps, with your permission, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, I may say that I hope the House will vote it into the Bill—the proviso in the Amendment in page 2, line 34. That is a new proviso based on an idea introduced in Committee by the hon. Member for Lewisham, North (Mr. MacDermot).
When we have to decide, aye or no, whether something is obscene matter likely, under the definition, to tend to deprave or corrupt, we have to consider whether such publication could reasonably have been expected to result from the publication by the person charged. We are, therefore, concerned only with publication reasonably to be expected to result from my lending the book to my friend.
I would assure you, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, that I do not lend a book of that kind to a friend if I think that there is the slightest risk of it tending to deprave or corrupt him. When I speak of myself, I speak, of course, forensically. I should have thought it quite unreasonable to expect that the person to whom it was lent would leave it about open for his children to look at—if it were a book of that character and he was a reasonable person. I would ask the hon. Member to bear in mind what the definition of an obscene article will be in the Bill. I think that the peril that he contemplates for


the particular lender of the particular book to the particular person is really rather a fanciful one.
I should like to add a word about television and broadcasting, particularly in relation to the anxieties expressed about video tape. I cannot remember whether the hon. Member who mentioned this was in the Standing Committee when we discussed it, but we believe that the idea of a prosecution in an attempt to effect a new form of censorship in that field to be quite academic. Television and broadcasting have their own censorship arrangements, as have films.
The point that we have always sought to make, and I believe it to be sound, is that it is inconceivable that on the full public broadcasting of B.B.C. or I.T.A. there would ever be a programme so flagrantly obscene that it could be prosecutable under this Bill. If it were. it would be very difficult for the defendant to defend himself, because such programmes go out and are published to a very wide audience.
In the same way, a film is licensed by the censors for public display, and really, keeping that in mind, what are the prospects of a prosecution which has to go forward at the Old Bailey? I would say that if those publicly charged with this censorship thought the subject matter right for public exhibition—well, it might go as far as a good luncheon with the sheriff, but after that the prosecution would die.
In those circumstances, while I always try to be as obliging as possible, I must here be unobliging, and adhere to my Amendment as it stands.

Mr. Charles Doughty: I rise with more than my usual diffidence, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, because I did not hear all my right hon. and learned Friend's opening remarks, although I did hear a good deal of what he said and of

what was said subsequently by hon. Members. Perhaps, therefore, I can approach this matter with an open mind in making this, my first intervention of any kind in the proceedings on this Bill.

Having heard the objections, I must say that I come down against the proposed Amendment to the Amendment. As to the arguments advanced in favour of it, I do not agree that the Bill should deal solely with the making of money out of obscene publications. It is a Bill which should deal with all aspects of obscene publications, and if it does not do that it ought to be amended so that it does. We can all, no doubt, think of many cases where obscene publications have produced very different, more immoral and perhaps more harmful results than the making of money.

In the Sexual Offences Bill, which was passed in the last Parliament, we endeavoured, and I think succeeded, in codifying most of the law relating to sexual offences. In my view, the Bill should deal so far as possible with the whole law relating to obscene publications.

Viscount Lambton: Are my hon. and learned Friend's fears covered by reference to that Act concerning pornographic material?

Mr. Doughty: It is not so covered under the Sexual Offences Act. This is a most undesirable form of giving and lending. It covers a most undesirable form of pornography, using the word not in the sense in which it is used in this Bill. I am sure that it is the wish of the promoters to make this a stronger Bill and I ask them, therefore, not to press the proposed Amendment to the Amendment, but to accept the Amendment of the Solicitor-General.

Question put, That "or" be there inserted in the proposed Amendment: —

The House divided: Ayes 40, Noes 28.

Division No. 91.]
AYES
[2.42 p.m.


Albu, A. H.
Hall, Rt. Hn. Glenvil (Colne Valley)
Reeves, J.


Balfour, A.
Holman, P.
Reynolds, G. W.


Bottomley, Rt. Hon. A. G.
Houghton, Douglas
Skeffington, A. M.


Bowden, H. W. (Leicester, S.W.)
Hunter, A. E.
Strachey, Rt. Hon. J.


Butler, Herbert (Hackney, C.)
Irvine, A. J. (Edge Hill)
Thomson, George (Dundee, E.)


Chapman, W. D.
Isaacs, Rt. Hon. G. A.
Warbey, W. N.


Cronin, J. D.
Jenkins, Roy (Stechford)
Weitzman, D.


Darling, George (Hillsborough)
MacColl, J. E.
Wells, William (Walsall, N.)


Davies, Ernest (Enfield, E.)
MacDermot, Niall
White, Mrs. Eirene (E. Filnt)


Deer, G.
Mallalieu, J.P. W. (Huddersfd, E.)
Younger, Rt. Hon. K.


Edwards, Robert (Bilston)
Mellish, R. J.



Gaitskell, Rt. Hon. H. T. N.
Mitchison, G. R.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)
Oliver, G. H.
Mr. Kenneth Robinson and


Grimond, J.
Peart, T. F.
Viscount Lambton


Hale, Leslie
Plummer, Sir Leslie





NOES


Allan, R. A. (Paddington, S.)
Hirst, Geoffrey
Profumo, J. D.


Brooman-White, R. C.
Hobson, John(Warwick &amp; Leam'gt'n)
Rawlinson, Peter


Courtney, Cdr, Anthony
Hylton-Foster, Rt. Hon. Sir Harry
Redmayne, M.


Craddook, Beresford (Spelthorne)
McAdden, S. J.
Renton, D. L. M.


Crowder, Sir John (Finchley)
Macmillan, Maurice (Halifax)
Sharples, R. C.


Ede, Rt. Hon. J. C.
Manningham-Buller, Rt. Hn. Sir R.
Simon, J. E. S. (Middlesbrough, W.)


Farey-Jones, F. W.
Mawby, R. L.
Thompson, R. (Croydon, S.)


Grimston, Sir Robert (Westbury)
Nicolson, N. (B'n'm'th, E. &amp; Chr'ch)
Whitelaw, W. S. I.


Harris, Reader (Heston)
Page, R. G.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Harrison, Col. J. H. (Eye)
Plckthorn, Sir Kenneth
Mr. Robert Jenkins and Mr Doughty.

Further Amendments to the proposed words made: In line 5, after "lets", insert "it".

In line 5, leave out from "hire" to third "or" in line 6.—[Mr. Roy Jenkins.]

Proposed words, as amended, there inserted in the Bill.

Clause 2.—(PROHIBITION OF PUBLICATION
OF OBSCENE MATTER.)

The Solicitor-General: I beg to move, in page 2, line 2, to leave out "obscene matter" and to insert:
and obscene article".
In view of the patent and firm determination with which the Government are "steamrollering" their Amendments into the Bill, I need say no more than that this is a consequential Amendment.

Amendment agreed to.

Further Amendments made: In page 2. line 20, after "matter", insert:
contained or embodied in an article".

In line 23, leave out "matter" and insert "article".

In line 27, leave out subsection (6).

In line 28 leave out "matter" and insert "article".—[The Solicitor-General.]

The Solicitor-General: I beg to move in page 2, line 34 at the end to add:
(7) In any proceedings against a person under this section the question whether an article is obscene shall be determined without regard to any publication by another person unless it could reasonably have been expected that the publication by the other person would follow from publication by the person charged.
The Clause, as amended in Standing Committee, fell under fire from my hon. Friend the Member for Worcestershire, South (Sir P. Agnew) on the ground that it was unintelligible, and it fell under fire from the hon. Member for Lewisham, North (Mr. MacDermot) on the ground that it was not the right test that was being applied.
It is difficult to find the right form of wording to apply because one wants all proper forms of publications to be referred to. On the other hand one does not want to have taken into account what will be unfair as against an individual person charged with publication. What the new proviso does is to adopt an idea founded basically on an Amendment tabled by the hon. Member for Lewisham. North, which makes the test that when one is considering obscenity and it is governed by the persons likely to read or hear the matter contained or embodied in the article published, in considering the position of any one publication one has to have regard only to such publications as would reasonably have been expected to result from the publication charged. We believe that is the right and fair answer.

Mr. MacDermot: I hope that the Solicitor-General's lucid explanation will satisfy The Times, which was worried about this Amendment. It meets our point. For my part, I am most happy and I hope that the House will accept the Amendment.

Mr. Ede: As a former magistrate, I have no faith in those who have survived as magistrates being able to understand what this form of words means at all. Each line seems to contradict the one in front of it and confirm the line but one in front of it. I look forward to many difficult explanations that will have to be given by magistrates' clerks to magistrates when they are considering what these words mean.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause 3.—(POWERS OF SEARCH AND SEIZURE.)

The Solicitor-General: I beg to move, in page 3, line 43, to leave out subsection (7).
The object of the Amendment is twofold. First, to remove the absurdity to which I had drawn the attention of the


House; secondly, to remove the proviso to sub-Clause 7, because I will ask the House to put another one in its place.

Amendment agreed to.

The Solicitor-General: I beg to move, in page 4, line 5, at the end to insert:
(8) For the purposes of this section the question whether an article is obscene shall be determined on the assumption that copies of it would be published in any manner likely having regard to the circumstances in which it was found, but in no other manner.
The idea is, in destruction proceedings, to ensure that the appropriate test in relation to the obscenity of the article is provided. The proviso that we have just voted into the Bill, the one which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) found so obscure, which makes it the test to look at the publications which may be expected to result from the publication in question, will not do for the purpose of destruction proceedings, because, there, one does not have any publication to which one can attach a phrase like the publication charged.
We have therefore, to find another test to put in and make it fair under this Clause. If one looks at the circumstances in which the matter seized was seized one can get a fair idea of the kind of publication likely to take place, and that would be a proper guide in this context. It is not difficult when the publication is being sold off a barrow in the street. One has to remember the wide possibilities in that context.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause 4.—(INITIATION OF PROCEEDINGS.)

3.0 p.m.

The Attorney-General (Sir Reginald Manningham-Buller): I beg to move, in page 4, line 10, to leave out Clause 4.
This Amendment, which stands in the name of my right hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General, is the last one on the Notice Paper, and I hope that in the course of this discussion it will have an unusual result for those Amendments. The Amendment seeks to leave out Clause 4 of the Bill, which states:
No proceedings under section two of this Act shall be commenced except with the consent of the Director of Public Prosecutions.
The first thing I want to make clear to the hon. Member for Birmingham,

Stechford (Mr. Roy Jenkins) is that the Government's objection to the Clause is based on principle. I want to make that clear at the outset, because I understand that in Standing Committee the hon. Gentleman said that it was not until my right hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General had spoken that ally question of high constitutional principle had been raised. In fact, at the request of the Select Committee, of which the hon. Gentleman was a member, I submitted a memorandum setting out my views on the proposal that no proceedings in respect of obscene libel should be instituted without my consent.
I will, if I may, quote from the memorandum. I said:
In my opinion the problem should be approached on the footing that it is a fundamental principle of English criminal law that proceedings may be instituted by private individuals and, accordingly, that the right to prosecute is unrestricted unless some very good reason to the contrary exists.
Therefore, right at the very beginning of the long discussions on this subject it was pointed out that there was a fundamental principle involved and one which applies in relation to restricting prosecutions to ones with the consent of the Director of Public Prosecutions, just as it does to restricting them to those with my consent. Indeed, I made it very clear then, for at the end of the memorandum, I said:
The conclusions I have expressed in this memorandum apply with equal force to any proposal that the right to institute proceedings should be limited to the Director of Public Prosecutions.
Unfortunately, the Select Committee, I am sorry to say, did not give me an opportunity of giving evidence before it in support of that memorandum, and without having heard any elaboration of the views therein expressed it recommended, for a reason which I will deal with in a short time, that the right to begin proceedings should be restricted to the Director of Public Prosecutions.
As my right hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General said to the Standing Committee—and I repeat it now—we regard it as most important that the right to prosecute should not be restricted unless there is some very good reason for imposing the restriction. During the course of this year one of Her Majesty's


judges— am quoting from the judgment —said:
One of the ultimate sanctions of the rule of law in this country is the right of private persons to lay informations and bring prosecutions.
I think that that was truly stated.
If one accepts this approach as correct —I have not heard it challenged and I hope that it will not be -then the question whether this Clause should remain in the Bill depends on whether there are good and sufficient reasons for making an exception to the general rule which, in my belief, is a general rule of considerable constitutional importance in England and Wales. The Government have carefully considered this question, and we have reached the conclusion that there is no good reason for departing in this instance from the general rule.
Three grounds for making the departure have been advanced in the course of the discussions. With great respect to those who advanced them, I am sorry to say that we think they are all bad grounds. I want to say a little about each of them in turn. The first reason advanced, and it was the only reason put forward by the Select Committee, was that it was desirable to restrict the right to institute prosecutions in order to secure uniformity in the administration of the law, a point that the right bon. Member for South Shields made in the debate on the Select Committee's Report. He said, on 16th December, 1958:
The standards of chief constables on these matters differ very considerably… it is highly desirable that publishers and authors should not be left in the position that a prosecution might be successful in one part of the country but not in another."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 16th December, 1958; Vol. 597, c. 1029.]
What the right hon. Member said then may have been very pertinent some years before, but it was slightly out of date in 1958 for, in 1958, we already had, as we have today, uniformity in the administration of the law in prosecutions by the police. Under the Prosecution of Offences Regulations of 1946, every chief constable is required to report to the Director of Public Prosecutions cases of obscene or indecent libels, exhibitions or publications where the chief officer of police thinks there is a prima facie case for prosecution.
Those Regulations in terms impose no restriction on the right to institute a prosecution, but the result has been that since 1946 there has not been one prosecution by the police for any offence connected with the publication of obscene libels which has not been instituted either by the Director of Public Prosecutions or with his consent. So that position is safely covered now.
Although the point the right hon. Member made would have been a very good one but for those Regulations, the effect of which might have escaped his recollection at the time, I hope I have satisfied him and others that it is not a good point now. Equally bad, with respect to him, was the point made by the hon. Member for Lewisham, North, because he said in Standing Committee that
The only way in which that uniformity can be satisfactorily assured is by making the consent of some person competent to deal with the matter necessary before prosecution can be commenced." —[OFFICIAL REPORT, Standing Committee C, 25th March, 1959; c. 172.]
For all practical purposes, the desired uniformity has been achieved and has been in operation since 1946.

Mr. MacDermot: I was not speaking in Standing Committee about uniformity of police practice. In fact, I think that I referred in my remarks there to the very point that the Attorney-General is making. I was anxious to have uniformity between private prosecutions and police prosecutions.

The Attorney-General: If there were private prosecutions, the observations of the hon. Member would have more point. I am dealing now with the practical matter, which is police prosecutions; because normally people report to the police when they are so brought.
I was going on to say that that was the reason put forward by the Select Committee and others who supported the insertion of this Clause and, in my submission to the House, it is not a good one. They may argue that if no police prosecution is now instituted without 'he Director's consent, no harm can be done by the retention of this Clause. I must confess that I should not think very much of that argument, the argument that one should impose a restriction because it will make no practical difference if one


imposes it, but that argument in turn is fallacious. I shall deal with it after I have dealt with the other arguments advanced for the Clause.
The second line of argument was that the restriction is justified on the ground that the offences under the Bill—and I quote words that I have used before in another context—
are in their nature liable to provoke vexatious legal proceedings, that is to say, proceedings instituted rather to gratify some whim of the prosecutor than to vindicate his rights or assist in the administration of justice.
That is one ground on which I stated in my memorandum to the Select Committee the restriction of the right to prosecute might be justified.
The hon. Member for Lewisham, North said in Standing Committee that it was precisely to protect people against prosecutions of that kind that the Clause is in the Bill. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Shields made the same point in the debate on the Select Committee's Report. He said that he remembered a number of prosecutions brought by a young woman in Birmingham which, he implied, were of a vexatious character. I can assure him, and I hope satisfy the hon. Member for Lewisham, North, that there have been no frivolous or vexatious proceedings for this sort of offence since 1946.
The young lady in Birmingham, to whom the right hon. Gentleman referred, did not, in fact, prosecute. She reported the matters to the police and on the advice of the Director of Public Prosecutions police prosecutions were instituted there were no private prosecutions at all. As: there have been no such frivolous or vexatious proceedings since 1946, I must confess that I see no reason to expect that there will be any in the future. I therefore submit to the House that the second reason advanced for this restriction is not valid at all.
I come to the third reason that was put forward. It has been said that there is an analogy between this Bill and the Children and Young Person (Harmful Publications) Act, 1955. I quoted that Act in a memorandum which I submitted to the Select Committee as an example of an enactment where the restriction of a right to prosecute could be justified. I said then that that was

justified owing to the difficulties of definition and drafting because the letter of the law is so wide that it could catch persons who have not offended against its spirit.
The House will remember that the Defence Regulations were often drawn in the widest possible terms to ensure that no one whom they were intended to catch should escape from the net, but the very width of the terms might have embarrassed a number of persons whom it was never the intention to bring within the ambit of the Regulations, so in relation to the Defence Regulations it was right to restrict the right to prosecute.
I made it clear when dealing with what perhaps I might call the "Horror Comics" Bill that it was on account of the difficulty of definition that that provision was inserted. I am sorry that the hon. Member for Stechford, no doubt due to faulty recollection, appears to have misled the Standing Committee on this point. He said that the amendment was made in another place. In fact it was not. It was made in this House as a result of an Amendment moved in this House by the hon. Member and after I had told him that the Government would accept the Amendment on account of the difficulty of definition.
I submit to the House that the "Horror Comics" Bill bears no relation to this Bill. There, we were dealing with horror comics which were easy to identify, but difficult to define. Here, the difficulty is not so much that of definition as the difficulty of substance. There was a considerable discussion in the Standing Committee about a particular work, which I will not advertise further, but it was interesting because it reveals the true problem here. The problem in relation to that and many similar works is not that of defining what constitutes an obscene libel so that the law will or will not apply to those works. The problem is not just one of definition, but one of principle. The problem in relation to such a work is to decide whether the law ought to apply to it. and on that subject few people agree.
3.15 p.m.
I am covering the ground as rapidly as I can. Those were the three reasons advanced for the Clause. To my mind, after very careful and, I can assure the


hon. Member, sympathetic consideration. they are not good reasons for departing from the general rule and they are not valid. I appreciate the desire for uniformity, but I do not think that the fears about the future have any basis in fact. I have carefully considered it and spent much time with others in considering it, and we have come to the conclusion that we must reject the Clause for those reasons.
The arguments which I have advanced, however, may not commend themselves to the promoters of the Bill as much as two further arguments which I desire to advance and which I will advance shortly. The Clause as it stands will, in my view, lead to results contrary to those which I understand the promoters of the Bill desire. The hon. Member for Stechford has, I understand, on occasion described the supporters of the Bill as liberalisers and its opponents and critics as at heart censors. I do not put myself in the latter category.
This Clause will, in fact, operate to impose a kind of censorship, because if it is allowed to stand, the publisher who contemplates publishing a borderline work will send it to the Director of Public Prosecutions and ask whether there will be a prosecution if he publishes it. One publisher has already told the Director that that is the course which he would pursue. The Director will be asked by publishers to operate a kind of censorship. If he answers the request, that is what he will be doing. If he does not answer it and the book is subsequently published and a prosecution brought, he will be open to criticism for being unhelpful, to say the least. That would be one effect of retaining the Clause.
The second reason, I think, is even more important. The House will appreciate that the Director of Public Prosecutions, if at present asked by people whether he will prosecute, can reply, "I will not prosecute. I do not think that the public interest requires it. If you think that there should be a prosecution you can yourself go to the courts and run the financial risks entailed".
If the Clause is retained in the Bill it will deprive the Director of Public Prosecutions of the right to make that kind of observation. The sole object of

imposing restrictions is to secure that the same standard is applied to the bringing of prosecutions, and I want to make it clear that if the Clause is retained the Director could not give consent to someone else prosecuting when he could not himself institute a prosecution. If it is left to him, and only to him, to decide whether a prosecution should or should not be brought, he will be duty bound to put before the courts borderline cases so that they may be tested, because it is only by bringing a disputed work before the court that he can properly protect himself in the execution of his duty.
I have discussed the matter with the Director on a number of occasions and I have no doubt at all that if the Clause is allowed to remain in the Bill it will mean an increase in the number of prosecutions. I have no doubt that that would be the case, because the Director would feel obliged to put to the test many of the cases in which, in the exercise of his discretion at present, he does not prosecute and advises the police not to prosecute.
I am glad to have had this opportunity of putting forward the grounds for resisting this proposal which commended itself to the Select Committee. The hon. Member for Stechford and his hon. Friends who supported it have always been able to rely on that fact. I hope, however, that I have been able to satisfy them that for this variety of reasons it would be an unwise step to insist upon these restrictions. It would, I believe, have an effect contrary to that which they desire. It would also involve a substantial breach in what I regard as a constitutional rule of some importance, although attention is not often drawn to it. It is of importance that unless good reasons can be established, private persons should not be deprived of access to the courts. For those reasons I have moved the Amendment.

Mr. Roy Jenkins: The right hon. and learned Gentleman has deployed a full-scale case to the House. I think that in all the circumstances, the House would be wise to accept the Amendment, and to do so as quickly as possible and without further debate.

Amendment agreed to.

3.22 p.m.

Mr. Roy Jenkins: I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
I do so very briefly. The Bill as it has emerged is a compromise Bill. The Solicitor-General has quite rightly pointed out that Government have not done much steamrollering, but the fact that the promoters of the Bill have, on the whole, won the Divisions, either in Standing Committee or in the House, does not mean that we have not made concessions too. Perhaps we have been wiser than the Government in choosing the Divisions. Certainly, the Bill in its final form bears more relation to the Government draft than to the original Bill to which the House gave a Second Reading two or three months ago. We do not complain about that. The compromise Bill, which has been produced by good will on all sides, will, I think, substantially improve the law in this difficult and complex subject.
In conclusion, I should like to thank those who have made this stage in the progress of the Bill possible, and particularly the noble Lord the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Viscount Lamb-ton), because without his support it would certainly not have been possible to have got the Bill through. There is no question whatever about that. I am also grateful to several of my hon. Friends, particularly the Members for St. Pancras, North (Mr. K. Robinson), Deptford (Sir L. Plummer) and Lewisham, North (Mr. MacDermot), who have been associated with the Bill in all its stages. I am also grateful to the Solicitor-General, who in some ways, particularly in Standing Committee, has had a difficult task on the Bill. He has been beaten in a number of Divisions. We are grateful for the unfailing courtesy and good humour with which he has taken those defeats and for the way in which, working with his right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, he has endeavoured to produce a Bill which would be acceptable to the promoters, to the House and, I hope, to opinion generally which is interested in these matters.

3.24 p.m.

Mr. Doughty: I want to say only two things about the Bill and its passage. One is that when the hon. Member for Birmingham, Stechford (Mr. Roy Jenkins) was gallantly but rather optimistically

trying to get the Bill through "on the nod", an expression with which we are all familiar, it fell to my lot on one or two occasions to object to it. I always hope that non-contentious matters in this House will go through in that way, but after what has happened on Second Reading, in Committee and on Report, how can anybody suggest that this was a non-contentious Bill with which everybody was in complete agreement and which should go through in that way? The deliberations which have taken place amply support the course of action which I took at the very early stages. The Bill having been obtained, the hon. Member for Stechford certainly cannot say that I have held it up in any way, my entire intervention being confined to about three minutes earlier this afternoon.
Now that this compromise Bill is just about to go through, I should like to compliment everybody concerned in it, whom I have seen only from a distance as a spectator on the Bill, on the common sense and give and take which they have shown, which, I hope, will he followed in a great many Private Members' Bills.
To anybody who is completely intransigent and says that a Bill must go through as it is or not at all, the answer is nearly always "Not at all." I had to say that earlier today in relation to another Bill. It was only because a concession was obtained on it at the last minute that we were able to give time for this Bill to reach its present stage now.
I compliment all concerned who have been through the Committee and Report stages on dealing with this undoubtedly difficult subject. We have been talking about definitions and about its ramifications. It is possible to have many different views. The proper discussion of the Bill and the proper Committee stage having been obtained and the Bill having been dealt with in the way that a complicated Bill of this kind ought to be treated, I do not wish to object to it or hold it up in any way. I only hope that it will work well in practice and cure the evils that it is designed to cure.

3.27 p.m.

Mr. K. Robinson: The House should not part with the Bill without expressing it; congratulations to my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Stechford (Mr.


Roy Jenkins) for all the work he has done on the Bill, and, indeed, on its predecessors. My hon. Friend has been gracious in thanking other people who have helped him, but the fact remains that throughout a period of about four years the initiative has come from him.
I agree with my hon. Friend that this is a Bill which the Government themselves should have tackled. It is a particularly thorny field of legislation, but if the initiative had to be left to a Private Member, it is very fortunate for all concerned that it has been left to my hon. Friend the Member for Stechford. He has been accommodating throughout, he has handled the Bill brilliantly, and I hope that it will now complete its passage to the Statute Book.

3.28 p.m.

The Solicitor-General: I should like to make just one or two observations before the Bill goes on its way. I do not suppose that such a complicated matter will entirely escape discussion in another place, but it will not be inspired by me and they are welcome to it as far as we are concerned.
It has been very hard work in Standing Committee. It would have been extremely hard work if the Committee had not been so quick on the point. That was largely due to the succinct, neat and cogent way in which, in particular, the hon. Members for Birmingham, Stechford (Mr. Roy Jenkins) and Lewisham, North (Mr. MacDermot), and other hon. Members interested, stated their case and the fair way in which they recognised from the first that the Government could not escape their duty in relation to this part of the criminal law of seeking to assist their views as we went along from time to time.
We had our brighter moments. There was a moment when I succeeded in voting against one of my own Amendments, and at least one moment when the hon. Member for Stechford succeeded in inducing a Member on this side to vote in favour of my propositions. But those things went by, and we now have a compromise Bill which I hope will be satisfactory in its working and a useful addition to our public law.
I should like especially to associate myself and the Government with what

has been said about the hon. Member for Stechford. It is truly his pertinacity and skill that have brought us to this stage, and it is right that we should take this opportunity of giving him the credit which is due to him.

3.30 p.m.

Mr. A. J. Irvine: I should like to join in the congratulations to my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Stechford (Mr. Roy Jenkins) for the very distinguished services he has rendered in bringing forward this Measure. I came in on the proceedings at a rather late stage, but it has been enjoyable and interesting to read the proceedings of the Standing Committee, which confirm how much valuable work was done there.
The Bill has offered a most admirable example of what can be achieved by cooperation between an hon. Member and his colleagues and the Government on a Private Member's Bill. It provides a very good example of the excellent results that can flow from such association. I only wish that there could have been equivalent governmental assistance on a Bill which I promoted, the Exchange of Dwellings Bill.
I am sure that my hon. Friend will be recognised as a benefactor at the Temple, among other quarters, and among all those who practise the law, because for a considerable time there has been a great deal of obscurity and difficulty in this branch of the law. The Bill will do a great deal to clear up difficulties which have existed, and in that respect no one will feel more indebted to my hon. Friend than lawyers for the services which he has given. It will be recognised that he has fought and worked hard for a long time on this matter. As I have said, I wish to join with the utmost warmth in the observations about what he has done.

3.33 p.m.

Mr. Robert Jenkins: I should like to join in congratulating the hon. Member for Birmingham, Stechford (Mr. Roy Jenkins) on getting the Bill as far as this stage. I shall do nothing to prevent the Bill going through, but unfortunately I must bring a note of discord into a debate which has been so pleasant and agreeable and in which everybody, perhaps with the exception of the right hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede), agreed with


the Bill generally and differed only in small particulars.
I remain completely unrepentant about my attitude to the Bill. I do so with some diffidence; nevertheless, I do so. I stated what I feel about it in Committee, and I shall not repeat what I said because it would be out of order. However, I consider that the Bill is a retrograde step and will make it more possible for literature of an unpleasant kind to be published in this country.
In Committee, a number of hon. Members, including the hon. Member for Islington, East (Mr. E. Fletcher), mentioned a book which has been referred to, although not by name, by the Solicitor-General this afternoon. None of us wants to give it any further publicity; therefore, I do not propose to give its name just in case the Bill may allow it to be published. The hon. Member for Islington, East thought that this book was a good one and ought to be read because it was full of good literature, but I think that that would be a book to which, but for the Bill, the attention of the police could be directed if published in this country. It is well known that a case concerning that book came before the courts some two years ago, and the person who sold it was heavily fined, with costs. At present the law of the country is, in my opinion, that that rather vicious and rather horrible book—I have read it more than once—is illegal. I pointed out to the hon. Gentleman the Member for Stechford that of this Bill goes through this is the sort of book which will be freely sold in the United Kingdom, when children, girls of 12 and others will be in a position to read it.
This Bill, in my view, is a retrograde step. With great respect, and almost with humility, I offer this contention, that it will prove a boomerang in relation to the law on obscene publications. Whereas I am perfectly certain that the promoters of the Bill believed, when the Bill was originally framed, that it would be for nothing but the good of the people concerned, my own feeling is that it will be a very dangerous weapon in the hands of the pornographers who write books. I think we shall find that people, and particularly the rather bad type of publisher whom we have been discussing today, who wish to make money out

of pornography, will have a much easier time. As I said in Committee, certain publishers are falling over backwards to publish books of this kind at the present moment, and without any doubt whatsoever they will be eased in their intention and be incited to go on to take action of this kind by the passing of this Bill.
The trend in this House, since I have had the privilege of being a Member, has always been to strengthen the law relating to crime and other matters of that kind. My right hon. and learned Friend has already mentioned, a moment or two ago, that when the teachers of this country banded together to prevent horror comics from being sold or distributed to children they produced a great deal of evidence to show the harm which those horror comics had done to the children. As a result, an Act was passed which prohibited by certain definitions the sale of comics of that sort. I must say that that was a first-class Act, and it has had an enormously good effect on the minds of the children of this country, and everybody was behind it. Everybody takes an interest in seeing what measures can be adopted to stop juvenile delinquency. Only this week we have been considering the Street Offences Bill. I see the hon. Member for Stepney (Mr. W. Edwards) is here. It was argued that that Bill was to protect young persons and to prevent them from going into that noxious trade.
I shall not detain the House long, but I would just develop this point, to show that I am not, perhaps, the crank which it may have been supposed I was on this matter. It seems to me that the trend of the House and the trend of legislation has been to strengthen those influences which bring to bear decent ideas and decent motives in the minds of children. I believe that as a result of this Bill the opposite will be the case. For the first time since the war, when this Bill gets on to the Statute Book, legislation will be passed which will loosen that stranglehold which society had on these vicious-minded pornographers. I believe that that will happen, and it will be a sad day if it does. Anything that tends to loosen the moral fibre and texture of the country, anything done in that direction by this House, particularly in regard to juveniles, is dangerous and contrary to the interests of the State.
There are plenty of decent books that most of us have not read. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will not mind my quoting what he said to me in private conversation some little time ago. He told me, "It would take fifty or a hundred years for any of us, reading all day, to read all the decent books there are to be read in this country." It would take us a long time, and our minds would be very well filled by the really clean and uplifting books now available. If publishers want to make money out of pornography and are permitted to make even more by this Bill—as I maintain they will—this is a bad Bill. Many decent-minded, clean authors will probably have their places taken, because they are not by any means such great money spinners, by the other type, and we may thereby lose fine books because of the desire to make cash out of pornography such as this Bill might permit.
I started by congratulating the hon. Member for Stetchford on his pursuing this Bill to its conclusion. I congratulate him on his pertinacity and on the way he has conducted this Measure through the Committee stage and through our proceedings today. With great respect to him, I think that it is highly creditable that it has got so far, but, holding my own strong views, it would be wrong if, even at this late stage, I did not say that, because of the effect it will have on large sections of the community, it is a bad Bill.
Some day someone will regret that it was ever passed. This Bill may loosen some of that sense of control, and perhaps weaken that influence for good that this country has always known in its books. It is a retrograde Measure. It takes us downhill. Although it will obviously be passed today and go to another place, I regret it.

3.43 p.m.

Mr. Ede: I should not have addressed the House but for the reference made by the hon. Member for Dulwich (Mr. Robert Jenkins) to my intervention in today's debate. My name is on the back of this Bill. I served on the Select Committee which examined two Bills and sat during two Sessions. The point that arose today arose only because of an Amendment put down by the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Solicitor-General, to which Amendments were put down by my hon. Friend. Until I came

here today, I had not had an opportunity of considering those Amendments, but I stand by every word that I said.
I think it regrettable that the Solicitor-General's Amendment was not passed as moved. I gave my reasons for that at the time, and I will not labour the point now, but I am a House of Commons man. The only way in which this Bill could now be amended would be by an Amendment in the House of Lords, and that I should very much resent. I want to make that plain. After all, the Amendment was carried here by 40 votes to 28 which, out of a membership of 630, cannot be regarded as an overwhelming expression of public opinion, but it is a better number than their Lordships generally manage to muster when they are sending legislation to us, and I hope they will take that into account.
I dread some of the things mentioned by the hon. Gentleman the Member for Dulwich and I think that there would have been better protection against them if we had made it clear that we are not legislating against profit but against the corruption of youth. no matter whether it is done for financial profit or for the delight some wicked people get out of titillating some of the least desirable passions they can arouse in youth. I am certain that in the end, if the effect of the Bill is as bad as the hon. Member for Dulwich says it will be, the conscience of this country will certainly revolt against it and there will have to be other legislation to amend it.
I join heartily and sincerely in congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Stechford (Mr. Roy Jenkins) and I hope he will believe that these words have been carefully chosen—on his great Parliamentary triumph. For it is nothing less than a triumph to get this Measure through in any form. Those of us who sat here when his father was in the House are glad to recognise in the hon. Member a worthy son of a father who gave great attention to the duties of this House, and whose early death all those who sat with him regarded as a considerable loss. Therefore, I congratulate my hon. Friend on what he has managed to achieve today.
My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Liverpool, Edge Hill (Mr. A. J. Irvine) strained my credulity almost


to the limit when he stood at the Box and declared, not on behalf of his party but on behalf of all the Inns of Court, gratification that legislation should be passed that will reduce the possibilities of litigation. I have heard trade union leaders sometimes make speeches about their motives which I have had to regard with some suspicion, but to ask me to accept that doctrine, even from a learned Member of my own party, is something to which I can never strain either my conscience or my belief.

3.48 p.m.

Mr. Eric Fletcher: Like my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede), I am only provoked to intervene for two minutes because the hon. Gentleman the Member fix Dulwich (Mr. Robert Jenkins) made a reference to myself in his speech. I do not doubt the sincerity with which the hon. Gentleman spoke, but I should not be supporting the Third Reading of this Bill this afternoon if I apprehended, as he did, the dire results which he thought might flow from its passage into law.
Like everybody else who has spoken during this Third Reading debate, I want to pay my tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Stechford (Mr. Roy Jenkins) on his great ability and perseverance in piloting this Measure through all its stages in this House over a long period of years. There is no doubt that the preponderance of opinion in this country will welcome the Bill because, if it does nothing else, in future it will place the law of obscene libel on a far more satisfactory basis than it has existed in the past. At the moment it is uncertain and capricious, and it produces a diversity of results which nobody can foresee.
I do not believe for a moment that the Bill will produce any ill effects, or that it will have any effect upon juvenile delinquents or potential juvenile delinquents. I do not believe that it will do anything to increase the distribution of pornographic literature. We would all agree that there is far too much pornography in this country today; in fact, it is one of the scandals of our time that much blatant pornography passes with immunity. The Bill will remove the predicament which has hitherto faced serious authors and publishers of serious literature in regard to their doubt

whether certain literature, whether by ancient or modern authors, would invite a prosecution.
Whatever else we may think, we would probably all agree upon the great desirability of checking juvenile delinquency. The principle enshrined in the Bill, namely, the liberty of the Press, is of equal importance. It is no part of the function of this House or of Parliament to act as a censor of literature. The hon. Member for Dulwich said, in effect, that he thought the Bill would result in much good, clean and decent literature having a smaller sale. I do not believe that for a moment. But even if that were to be the case, it is not a question for us to judge. Every member of the public must be free to judge for himself what and what not to read. Serious authors, especially of literature which has artistic or other merits, must be free, without any risk of censorship or control, to publish work of that kind. I welcome in particular the new Clause introduced by the Solicitor-General which makes that abundantly clear.
I also welcome the Clause enabling expert evidence to be called. In future, when any publication is challenged, the persons responsible for it—publishers, authors or otherwise—will be able to call as witnesses, as they have not been able to do in the past, independent persons either as literary critics or persons engaged in social welfare to give their opinions on the merits of the publication.
I therefore join with other Members in hoping that the Bill will have as smooth a passage in the other place as it has had here, but that it will be dealt with more quickly.

3.55 p.m.

Sir K. Pickthorn: I shall be as quick as I can in making my speech. Everybody seems to have enjoyed this debate very much, and everybody seems to be extremely pleased with everybody else. I gathered from the speech of the hon. Member for Islington, East (Mr. Fletcher) that the preponderant opinion of the country is quite clear that the Bill is a great improvement. The great preponderance of opinion in the country must be quicker on the uptake than the preponderant opinion in this House, because the House has no corporate opinion on this matter at all. The one thing


that is quite clear from today's debate —every word of which I have heard—is that this was a most unsuitable exercise for a Private Member's Bill. It has not had a proper discussion in the House.
My other point is that what has been said to be the main improvement in the Bill is not, so far as I can understand, understood by anyone. The hon. Member for Birmingham, Stechford (Mr. Roy Jenkins) was in favour of these experts—and we have now been told that these people may be experts in social service, whatever that is —sometimes because he thought that their evidence might go to upset what would otherwise be prima facie obscene, and sometimes—as he made clear in the same paragraph of his speech—because even if the article were obscene, if the experts thought that it had sufficient literary value it would not be interfered with. That is the deepest thing in the Bill. I have heard not a word about it today. We have not heard a word about it on the Floor of the House either before today. What was the intention of the Bill as introduced on that point I do not know. What is the intention of hon. Members opposite or the Solicitor-General at the moment, I do not know, and if I knew both those things I should not have the least idea what the effect is going to be.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed.

BETTING REFORM BILL

Order read for resuming adjourned debate on Question [13th March], That the Bill be now read a Second time.

Question again proposed.

3.56 p.m.

Mr. Walter Edwards: When, on 13th March, as a result of the Closure of the debate, I had to resume my seat, I was saying that I considered the Bill to be a bad and unnecessary Bill. Two hon. Members who supported the Bill were rather rude because the Closure had been moved after they had spent a great deal of time speaking in the debate, but they were not aware that I was present in the House not for the purposes of the Second Reading debate on the Betting Reform Bill but to support my hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham, North (Mr. MacDermot) and his Protection of Tenants (Local Authorities) Bill. I thought that the House might like to know that those hon. Members who resented my intervention were wrong on that point.
When I spoke on that occasion, I said that the £6½ million spent on research and other purposes connected with racehorses had been thrown down the drain, because I considered that the racehorses of today were certainly no better than those of fourteen years ago and, in many cases, were much worse. I can see no reason, so far as racehorses or punters are concerned, why the additional powers proposed in the Bill should be given to the Racecourse Betting Control Board. The money obtained from tote investment and applied to research to make horses rather faster or better bred in future is. in my view, simply money wasted.
Even if the money were not wasted, is not the point that if a punter puts is. on the tote, out of which a percentage is taken, and money from that percentage is spent on improving the racehorses, it will not be the punter who will get value for that money? If a horse is specially bred and gains a reputation throughout the world, no doubt the breeder will get a great deal of money out of it, but the money never comes back to the punter. If the horse becomes a very good horse and wins the Derby, the owner sends it to stud and makes quite a fortune out of it.
I am not attacking the bookmakers, any more than I am attacking the Board of Control, but I say sincerely that I cannot see that the Board is doing a good job. Therefore, I strongly oppose giving the Bill a Second Reading. Nothing would make one more anxious to oppose the Bill than a study of the OFFICIAL REPORT of the previous debate. Quite a large number of hon. Members—

It being Four o'clock, the debate stood adjourned.

Debate to be resumed upon Friday next.

FOREIGN OFFICE FEES

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Whitelaw.]

4.1 p.m.

Mr. Ernest Davies: I wish to draw attention to the Foreign Service Fees Order, 1959, and I do so because under this Order about 150 fees charged by the Foreign Office for a variety of documents and services have been increased. A large number of these fees are concerned with documents and services as applied to foreign countries. I do not necessarily object to them, but I particularly wish to draw attention to the increase in the passport renewal fee, which has been doubled from 10s. to 20s.
During the short Easter Recess this Order was made and was then laid before the House. That meant that it was not available to Members in the Vote Office until 2nd April, although it came into force on 1st April. That meant that Members had no opportunity of questioning the representatives of the Foreign Office about the increases, nor had they any opportunity of debating them. Further, only a few weeks earlier the Estimates of the Foreign Office had been presented to the House, and in them no reference was made to these increases; so, again, the attention of the House was not drawn to them.
Therefore, it appears that either by accident or design Parliament in this case was by-passed, and, if it were not for the fact that the Foreign Office was responsible, I would suggest that there had been some sharp practice here. I consider it a very dangerous practice to

refrain from informing Parliament of changes in charges which are, in effect, taxes. It is a very dangerous practice to impose charges upon the community without Parliament being given the opportunity to give its consent to them. After all, King Charles I lost his head for doing that.
Apart from the short notice which was given to Parliament and the bypassing of Parliament in the way I have stated, the increased charges, and particularly that for the renewal of passports, were imposed at very short notice. Travel agents and others had only 24 to 48 hours' notice from seeing the announcement in the Press that the charge was increased, and, inevitably, this put them to very considerable inconvenience as they handled these matters on behalf of their clients. It also made a difference to those who were planning their holidays and found that their passports would cost more.
When Questions were asked about the increase, the Under-Secretary tended to minimise the amount by which the charge was increased and the effect it would have on those who required to renew their passports. It is true that the effect on the individual may not be great, but if there happens to be a normal-sized family and each member of the family holds a separate passport which falls due for renewal, the figure does mount up. Whether the cost of £1 instead of 10s. for renewing a passport deters travel or not, the increase is quite unjustified, unnecessary, and is a tax on travel.
The Under-Secretary justified the increase on two grounds. First, that the administrative costs were up. Secondly, that the revenue was needed. It is perfectly true that administrative costs have risen since 1931, but so has the cost of travel. The cost of travel since 1931 has increased tremendously and it means that there is a far greater revenue accruing to the Foreign Office from the issue of passports than formerly. The staff issuing passports has not increased proportionately because the overheads have been spread, on the basis of a commercial business. There is a strong case for reducing the price of passports rather than increasing them.
The Under-Secretary said that the
renewal fee… was fixed at 10s. in 1931 and was so out of line with present costs that it was decided to increase it."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 13th April, 1959: Vol. 603, c. 640.)


I should like to show the House how much out of line it was, or is. The cost of issuing and renewing passports in the United Kingdom is £524,000 a year. The fees derived from their issue and renewal is £1,150,000—more than twice as much. The Foreign Office is making a profit or. the issue and renewal of passports in this country of £626,000 per annum, a profit of 120 per cent.
That shows how much out of line the charges are. They are completely out of line because they are far too high. The Foreign Office is doing so well on this that it is qualifying for a "take-over" bid. Allowing for the cost of renewal, the cost of issuing a passport today is 15s. There is a profit to the Government of I5s. on the issue of each passport, which means that every person is paying double the cost of issuing that passport. He is being taxed to obtain it.
It is true that on the issue and renewal of passports abroad by embassies and consulates there is a loss, but it means that those resident in this country are subsidising those who obtain their passports abroad. Why should a resident of the United Kingdom subsidise those who live abroad, or who are foolish enough to forget to renew their passports before travelling abroad? Why should a working man who takes his family abroad for a holiday, maybe for the one time in his life, subsidise the beachcomber in Majorca, or Hawaii, who fails to renew his passport and has to pay for doing so and for the privilege of retaining his British citizenship while living abroad and, at the same time, escaping the payment of taxes in this country? I see no justification for that. Every United Kingdom citizen has a right to this document and most people are proud to carry it.
I could make out a case for granting a passport free to every citizen as a right. Certainly, the maximum charge made to the person seeking a passport should be the administrative cost of issuing it. I would remind the Under-Secretary that the O.E.E.C. recommended that principle in its report on tourism. It recommended that there should be a reduction in the price of passports to the limit strictly necessary for covering the cost of issue and delivery of the passport. The Government were a party to that report, but they are certainly not carrying out the

recommendation. Since the report was issued the Government have increased the cost of renewal of passports and are doubling the cost of issuing passports.
On the second count, the Under-Secretary said that another factor was that the issuing and renewal of passports bring in a considerable revenue which the Government need. There are 200,000 renewals of passports per year. That means that the additional 10s. will bring in another £100,000. Is the Foreign Office really so "broke", with its Civil Estimate of some £18 million, that for lack of this £100,000 it will go bankrupt?
Surely, when the Chancellor is distributing largesse in his Budget, and reducing the price of beer by 2d. a pint, the Foreign Office cannot be so hard up that it has to seek this further £100,000 by imposing a tax on travel. I suppose that in the embassies they do not drink beer, and if the common man, who rarely enjoys the hospitality of the embassies, must pay twice as much for renewing his passport in order that their lavish entertainment can continue, then, I suppose, it is justified. I do not think that the Under-Secretary gave a diplomatic answer. Coming from that source, it is a shocking answer.
Following the establishment of the Welfare State and with compulsory holidays with pay, foreign travel has greatly increased. Of that we are all very well aware. It is welcomed by all and is generally accepted as a means of furthering international good will and understanding. At the same time, the greater ease and speed of travel from one country to another enables more and more people in more and more countries to get to know each other better. By and large, people are finding out that people the world over are very much alike and have far more in common to unite them than differences to divide them. In this way travel makes a unique contribution to the ability of people to live in peace.
In these circumstances, it seems to me that it is incumbent upon all responsible Governments to encourage the exchange of their nationals with the nationals of other countries. As a matter of fact, to that end the Council of Europe has made certain recommendations, and action on those recommendations has been taken by a number of countries. It recommended that the passport should be


replaced by an identity card for periods of short travel, for tourism, and the like The citizens of seven Western European countries are able to travel to countries in Western Europe with identity cards instead of passports. These cards are sometimes issued free and sometimes for a small charge.
I do not understand why this country cannot do the same. Parliamentary Questions have frequently been asked on the subject, but the Foreign Office has stood out adamantly against the proposal. This country could, perhaps, contribute more than any other country to international understanding, because I believe that more people from this country travel abroad than from any other European country. Yet we appear to put more obstacles in the way of travel and more impositions on those who travel than any other country. Not only is there this increase for the renewal of passports—and 30s. is double what it need be—but air travel imposes landing fees, which recently increased from 5s. to 7s. 6d.
I had the privilege to work with Ernest Bevin at the Foreign Office. As the House knows, he was a great believer in freedom of travel as a promoter of better human and international relations. I recall that at the Labour Party Conference at Bournemouth in June, 1946. he said:
I want to grapple with the whole problem of passports and visas. A diplomat asked me in London one day what the aim of my foreign policy was and I said it was, ' To go down to Victoria Station, get a railway ticket and go where the hell I liked without a passport or anything else.' I stick to that.
That was Ernest Bevin's philosophy in the matter of travel. He tried to put that into practice.
I remember that in 1950 he sent me on an official tour to certain Central European and Eastern European countries with a view to fostering better relations and trying to re-establish relations where they had not been restored since the war, including those between Greece and Yugoslavia. Before I went, he drew his finger across the map of that part of Europe and pointed out to me the frontiers, saying, "Here the international expresses ran across the frontiers before the war. Now they are halted". He said, "We must get those trains running again for, once we get the wagons-lit

crossing the frontiers, we shall have better relations." I went on the trip and I recall telephoning to him in London before I left asking if he had any final instructions for me. He said, "Yes, Ernest, only this. Be tough with Tito and get those trains running."
My final word to the Under-Secretary —with whom I have considerable sympathy, because I once occupied the post that he now holds and I know that he has been called upon to defend something of which no doubt he had no knowledge until Questions were asked in the House. and for which he was not responsible—is. be tough with the Treasury and get these passport fees down.

4.17 p.m.

Mr. Eric Fletcher: I am very glad to have the opportunity of supporting what my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, East (Mr. Ernest Davies) has said. By now, the Foreign Office should have recognised that it made a very great mistake in introducing this Order at all and in introducing it in the way it did. Its action has been condemned by The Times and nearly every other responsible newspaper.
It was particularly unfortunate that this Order was promulgated on the eve of the Easter Recess and came into force seven days after being promulgated. It was a mere accident that because it was made under an Act of 1891 it did not need modern procedure and to be laid before the House. I am quite certain that if it had been so laid and was subject to a negative Resolution, there would have been a Prayer against it. My hon. Friend has said that the duty of the Foreign Office should be to encourage and not to discourage travel. More and more people travel abroad and it is a good thing that they should do so. A great many people who, hitherto, have not had the means of travelling abroad do so now for the first time.
The imposition of the increased fee for renewal of a passport is mischievous. I cannot see that any fee is justified for a passport. Certainly, the Foreign Office could not justify charging more than the bare minimum to cover administrative costs. There should be no tax on travel. A British subject should be free to travel anywhere. As a matter of law, he is free to travel everywhere and free to re-enter


the country. A passport is a matter of international convenience. Nothing should be done by the Foreign Office to make travel more difficult. As my hon. Friend has said, the attitude of increasing fees for passports and visas is a retrograde step. It has been condemned by the Council of Europe and other international organisations. This country, in accordance with its long traditions, ought to set an example in that respect.
I hope that by now the Foreign Office will have recognised that it has made a grave blunder and that it will have the courtesy to acknowledge that blunder. If it is not too late, I hope, in the interests of those looking forward to travel this year, the Foreign Office may be persuaded to withdraw this mischievous, unnecessary and inopportune increase of fees.

4.21 p.m.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Mr. Robert Allan): As the hon. Member for Enfield, East (Mr. Ernest Davies) has said, he served in the office that I at present hold. His photograph is on the wall of my office. It looks down on me from there, flanked by rather more faces than confront me this afternoon. Nevertheless, it catches the light in a certain way so that I see his face and am more conscious of it than I am of some equally illustrious predecessors, Lord Curzon and others. The face that looks down from the wall is shrewd and not altogether unkind, so I rather expected the hon. Gentleman to speak in the way that he did this afternoon.
The hon. Gentleman was perfectly justified in attacking me for emphasising the need for revenue. I made that statement at the end of a series of supplementary questions, and my only defence, I must say quite frankly, is that it was rather a foolish statement. It was foolish, not in the way of letting the cat out of the bag or exposing a secret we wished to keep hidden, but because I did not relate increased revenue to the increased costs which we have to bear. That is the crux of the matter, and I should like to deal with it in some detail.
As the hon. Gentleman said, this affects a large number of people. One of the most significant things of the last eight or nine years is the increase in the number of our citizens who travel. That, in turn, reflects the general growth in our

living standards. In 1951, 1,240,000 British citizens travelled abroad. In 1958, that figure was almost exactly double—2,400,000. There are arguments, of course, and both hon. Members produced some of them, in favour of abolishing passports altogether. What is often forgotten, although I think that the hon. Member for Islington, East (Mr. E. Fletcher) mentioned it, is that the British Government do not require British citizens to possess passports. British citizens carry passports only to meet the requirements of the Governments of the countries which they choose to visit. British subjects, therefore, buy passports not because they are forced to do so by this Government but because they wish to travel. It seems to me perfectly fair that if people wish to travel they should pay at least for the document that permits travel in the countries to which they want to go.

Mr. Ernest Davies: Why pay double?

Mr. Allan: I will come to that in a minute. I think that is the answer to those whose general suggestions have amounted to the proposal that travel should be subsidised by the British taxpayer. The argument against that is strengthened by the fact that travellers obviously are not among the neediest of Her Majesty's subjects. It is also part of the answer to the hon. Gentleman's assertion that we are imposing a tax on travel.
The other question is whether the price which we are charging is excessive in relation to the costs. Part of the function of our posts abroad is the issue and renewal of passports and the giving of help and advice on related nationality questions. Since the passing of the 1948 Act this work has been quite heavy. It has always been accepted that passport fees in general should contribute towards the cost of this work, and the cost of this work, of course, is directly related to the cost of the Foreign Service. We therefore try to establish fees which have some relation to the total costs.
It must be done on a universal basis. The hon. Member for Enfield, East suggested that it was unfair that the British traveller should subsidise the permanent British resident abroad who had to renew his passport or to obtain a new passport abroad. We could not


have separate rates. I am sure that his experience of the Foreign Office will have shown him that. Even among our own highly mechanised and centrally organised depots in the United Kingdom, the cost of each passport varies considerably. But each passport issued here obviously costs us less than each of the five issued last year in Katmandu or of the 10 which were issued in Papeete or of the 16 which were issued in Kabul. These, in turn, cost less than each of the 6,000 which were issued in our various posts throughout the United States. Everywhere, from Algiers to Zurich, we must have a common fee.
The hon. Member tried to show that the Foreign Office had made a profit of over £600,000 on the issue of passports. I do not deny that there was a surplus. His figures are not quite correct, because he did not take into account the various overheads under other Votes. He will find that the figure which I gave was that there was an estimated surplus last year of £524,000. I am sure that he does not wish to quarrel on the size of the figure, however; the point is that we showed a surplus.
The figure of £524,000 is in relation to a total expenditure on the Foreign Service of about £17½ million. The passport surplus in the United Kingdom was therefore 3 per cent. of the total Foreign Service expenditure. In 1931 it was also 3 per cent. The increase on two occasions in the cost of a new passport has maintained that relationship more or less steady, and up to now the renewal fee has not been changed since 1931.
Towards the end of last year the whole question of fees was reviewed in the light of present-day costs. It was decided to bring the major fees into line with the charges made by notaries and business and professional bodies, but at the same time it became clear that the United Kingdom passport surplus would be a bare 2 per cent. of the total vote. Rather than alter the cost of a new passport it was decided to increase by 10s. the cost of renewal. On present estimates, the United Kingdom passport surplus will be 2·8 per cent. of the total Foreign Service costs.
I wish that I were able to prove conclusively that this figure of 3 per cent. is the right proportion for the United Kingdom passport surplus to bear in relation to the general expenses of the Foreign Service. Unfortunately, it is not possible to prove that because of the many variable factors involved. I have discussed the matter at several meetings with officials in the Foreign Office, and it seems to me clearly a reasonable proportion. Moreover, it has been accepted for thirty years.
That the percentage has, if anything, slightly fallen, is the answer to the hon. Member's complaint that revenue had risen more steeply than expenditure. In relation to the whole cost it has not. Nor do I believe that it is a serious argument to suggest that an increase of 2s. a year in the cost of renewing a passport will deter anyone from travelling.
I should have liked to go into a little more detail on other points, but before I close I must briefly answer the complaint by several hon. Members that Parliament was by-passed. It was not bypassed. The Act does not require that this matter should be laid before Parliament. On the other hand, I regret that when the Estimates were published we did not make a reference to this increase which would have drawn hon. Members' attention to it. I am sorry that this was not done—and my right hon. and learned Friend has asked me to express these sentiments. There was no disrespect to Parliament. We were not obliged to include it in the Estimates, but I think that it was an error of judgment not to do so.
Finally, whereas it costs a British subject £2 10s. to hold a passport for ten years, the average cost in 16 European countries which I have investigated is £8 4s. 6d.—

The Question having been proposed after Four o'clock, and the debate having continued for half an hour, Mr. SPEAKER adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.

Adjourned at twenty-nine minutes to Five o'clock.